


breaking point

by unrivaled_tapestry



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Horse Boy Ferdinand, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multi, background Edeleth, background Lincas, background doropetra, please check author note for additional warnings, the first chapter is mostly hurt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-04-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:35:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 23,524
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22080037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unrivaled_tapestry/pseuds/unrivaled_tapestry
Summary: Edelgard believes Hubert is dead. Ferdinand knows he can't be.
Relationships: Ferdinand von Aegir & Edelgard von Hresvelg, Ferdinand von Aegir/Hubert von Vestra
Comments: 87
Kudos: 409





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all, threw this one up because I apparently didn't have enough WIPs.
> 
> Please note that while character death was not included in the warnings, a lot of the first chapter is various people believing Hubert is dead and responding to that accordingly. This is angst with a happy ending but please keep that in mind.
> 
> This first chapter also has a lot of Ferdinand + Edelgard platonic relationship building. Chapter 2 will be more purely Ferdibert.

_Minister,_

_Come immediately to the old von Aegir estate. Although the manor has been searched before, a cursory examination today revealed a passageway to a lower level not previously identified during the liquidation of the property._

_You will want to see this yourself._

_Signed, T_

Ferdinand didn’t know what else to do, so he went to the stables. It was after midnight, though someone usually stayed on duty in case of emergency or noble insomnia. Likewise, Edelgard had told him, as politely as possible, that his presence was not expected at any meeting or official function for the remainder of the week. He had nowhere else _to_ be.

Despite everything, the second his boots tapped on the smooth stones of the floor, he felt some little pleasant sensation filter in through the numbness that had swallowed him for days. The dust made his nose itch, but the fresh hay was almost sweet. The sound of gentle nickering from a gelding near the entrance brought him back to a thousand good moments of stepping into a barn for the first time. He couldn’t do much. He could barely be a person right then. But he could be present there.

It was just after midnight, and Ferdinand had to reassure a groom who tried to crawl out of his cot and fuss over him, and instead made for his mare Ophelia’s stall himself.

Already awake, her brown eyes glittered as she spied him approaching in the low light from the dimmed lanterns. She shook her head, ears flopping as she stretched her long neck out to sniff his extended hand. In return, he whispered kinder sentiments to her than he had for the world, or himself. He caught her and pressed his forehead against her neck. She gave a loud burst of air, and he began brushing her, taking care to untangle the feathers and the puff of long hair under her jaw. His hands flew through the motions; he’d done it so many times it was as easy as breathing for him—tonight, it was easier.

He tacked her up himself in a simple sport saddle and went for the main training area. A groom on duty lit the sconces with a whisper of minor magic, and left Ferdinand to his paces.

He was alone.

Ferdinand started with his in-hand work. He did a quick warm up on a circle, guiding the lead rope with gentle twists from his hands—asking for more, less, and focus. The exercise rider hadn’t been able to take her out, and Ferdinand hadn’t visited for three days, so she had to puff out some of the heat in her bones before he got on her.

After he was satisfied that she would listen, he got on. Truth be told, he didn’t care for riding in armor. He was more vulnerable in his simple tunic, vest, and breeches, for sure, but he felt freer, like it was the only time he could be buoyant. He craved that feeling. Any feeling.

He started at a walk before moving to a trot. She followed him through figure eights and practically read his mind during up and down transitions. Going to the left, her circle was perfectly smooth, but she always had trouble finding bend to the right, so he engaged his leg and worked his inside rein until she loosened up.

His hair flew behind him, threatening to come out of its sloppy bun. The sensation reminded him of the fingers that, until recently, would comb through it in the mornings when their owner thought Ferdinand was still asleep.

Ferdinand suddenly felt as though his hair was rather bothersome.

When he was done taking Ophelia through her paces, Ferdinand simply rode. They zig zagged through the arena at a walk, her head swinging comfortably back and forth while Ferdinand just let his body be. Let it exist without emotion, just following the movement of the saddle and the way the world swayed. He heard her breath, waited for her heartbeats, then placed his palm in front of the saddle and felt her shoulder move forward and back.

This he could do.

Edelgard sat across from Ferdinand, the tea in her hand untouched. Instead, she lightly tapped the saucer. She’d not said much, and Ferdinand couldn’t escape the feeling that she thought he was as breakable as that porcelain. He was no mind reader, of course, but he felt it in her eyes, the way she now gently refuted him when he suggested a course of action she disagreed with, instead of growing short and firm. Her eyes, sometimes kind but always gathering, always calculating, now had a touch more of the world-weary sadness he’d always associated with her. He knew she grieved too, but he couldn’t stand how that sadness only seemed to deepen when she looked at him.

He wished they could simply grieve together; nothing rankled him like her pity.

“I don’t think he’s dead,” Ferdinand announced to the silence between them, mustering up what felt like a fraction of his strength.

“If not, why do you think he hasn’t returned, or sent some kind of communication?” Her brow furrowed, and he wondered if she was evaluating his theory or his sanity.

“He could have been captured,” Ferdinand said. “There would be no one more valuable to our enemy. The Snakes.”

“Those Who Slither,” she corrected him lightly, finally taking a sip of her tea. “Our forces saw no one exit or enter the building, and you yourself said you dispatched the enemies you encountered.”

“Whatever they are called,” Ferdinand said. “We were not able to recover his body. This enemy is crafty. Surely that gives you pause.”

“You said it yourself when we fished you out of the mote,” Edelgard said. “He pushed you off the third floor as the building burned, but you didn’t see him follow you.”

Ferdinand bit his lip. “At first I thought he went back for those damn records. Now, I believe there may have been an enemy we missed, or who was not as dead as we believed. We were rushed after all. Someone could have taken Hubert by surprise and warped away.”

Edelgard sighed, and he saw the tension enter and leave her shoulders. “Ferdinand, did you sleep at all last night?”

His own frown deepened. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“Just,” Edelgard began, carefully working the word over in her mouth, “you don’t look well.”

A lance of anger started smoldering in Ferdinand’s stomach. He felt hot, and tears started to work at his eyes. “You were everything to him. You won’t even consider—”

“I thought it was possible,” Edelgard said, her own voice sharpening. “You don’t think I’ve had his agents working night and day, looking for any indication that Those Who Slither have acquired a major asset? Capturing an enemy spymaster is a lot for even the most precise organizations to hide. There’s been _nothing_ , Ferdinand.” She bent her head, pressing it into her palms. “At a certain point, for my own sake…I simply have to acknowledge what is _realistic_.”

Ferdinand shook his head. “You’re giving up on him.”

He saw a flash of something dangerous, of flame behind Edelgard’s eyes, and he knew he’d misstepped as soon as he said it. He opened his mouth to apologize, but she planted her palm dangerously on the tablecloth. The wooden stem groaned as she pressed down on it.

“Ferdinand, I have lost my right arm,” her voice stayed low, smoldering. “I don’t deny you your grief. Please don’t deny me mine.”

Ferdinand sat pinned to his chair, until Edelgard’s shoulders relaxed and she sat back into her own seat, the heat disappearing from her eyes and the strength draining out of her shoulders as she sank into the little chair. “I know…the two of you grew close recently. He and I spent years preparing for this.”

He brushed off his coat, trying to mask the spike of very real fear he’d felt cutting through his pain. He’d been fortunate enough to not have the raw power of Edelgard’s crests directed towards him before. It was unlike her not to be in perfect control, and it occurred to him that perhaps she wasn’t sleeping either.

“Do you wish it had been me?” Ferdinand asked the silent room, his voice simultaneously quiet and booming.

Edelgard’s frown deepened. “What?”

“Do you wish it had been me instead of Hubert?” He felt his voice start to tremble as he spoke, three hours of sleep set his nerves on edge like the strongest cup of coffee.

Her eyes widened. “No. Ferdinand, of course not.” She squeezed her eyes shut, looking away and pushing away the teacup in front of her. “You too are my friend. I’m glad to have you here. Hubert didn’t take many things for himself. I’ve borne grief before—I don’t want to think about what his would have looked like.”

She reached across the table to him, offering her hand.

Ferdinand didn’t take it.

He rose to his feet. “Do whatever you must, Edelgard. But…I do not believe he’s dead, and I will prove it to you.”

Ferdinand went for walks in the gardens while he waited for Edelgard to return him to his official duties. He walked in no real hurry. His body was already healed from his fall—he’d been lucky. Some bruising from the water and a sprained ankle from when Petra had deposited him on the ground from the back of her pegasus.

Still, his mind kept returning to the fire that had ravaged his father’s home. He and Hubert had tried to escape from the lower floor, but a pack of men in masks and dark clothing—some wielding magic, others wielding axes or arrows—cornered them. They’d fought their way up through the rising smoke, Hubert doing what he could to clear it with wind, but elemental magic was not his specialty.

When they’d reached the top floor, with nowhere else to go, Hubert had grabbed Ferdinand by the lapels. In that moment, Ferdinand had been sure that there was no way out, that the two of them were cornered and would die hacking on smoke.

_“I have to get those documents,”_ Hubert had said.

Ferdinand didn’t remember what he said, his head feeling light and his lungs burning.

Hubert had smiled, almost kindly, and then shoved Ferdinand out the window. Ferdinand remembered the glass crunching against his back, the sensation of slipping out the window, then falling, and he remembered waking up on the grassy lawn of Aegir manor while the building burned in the distance, lighting up the night like a small sun. The heat from the inferno warmed his cheek as he coughed truly wretched water onto Linhardt’s boots.

“ _Ferdinand_ ,” Dorothea had asked, drawing out each syllable like it wasn’t the first time she’d tried, _“where is Hubie?”_

_“I don’t know.”_ Ferdinand coughed the words out, breaking off in a truly alarming wheezing fit as Linhardt tried to fill his lungs with faith.

He didn’t remember much after that, except flashes of the infirmary. It wasn’t until the next day when Edelgard came to tell him the news.

Ferdinand stopped and stared back at the imperial palace. It towered over the gardens, and the last of the year’s hot sun reflected off the painted white walls and glistening windows.

It was all too easy to imagine it burning at night.

Ferdinand grabbed the back of his own neck, trying to fight the tight band of pain that started there and wrapped around his forehead. _Sleep_ , Linhardt’s voice echoed in his head, _I can give you something for the nightmares_. Of course, Ferdinand refused, but the idea of an herbal calm was beginning to feel better and better.

He’d experienced loss before. Of course. His father’s death following escape from house arrest left only a deep feeling that things could have been different, and that he would now never have the chance. He knew what the shock of denial felt like, the hot lash of anger that followed.

This was different. He kept thinking back to the manor, to watching Hubert’s shadow disappear from the windowsill. Hubert always took carefully conceived risks. When he pushed Ferdinand out the window, that removed him from the calculation, and had left Hubert free to go search for the research materials left behind.

Hubert spent a good deal of time after battles berating Ferdinand’s tendency to charge into an enemy line and hope for the best. _It will be the death of you_ , Hubert always said to him in his tent, quick hands helping Ferdinand replace bandages or remove stitches from a recent misadventure.

Hubert didn’t care for gambling. War and espionage came with a certain amount of inherent risk, but he rarely acted unless he was sure his chance of success crossed a certain threshold.

Ferdinand didn’t believe Hubert would have done what he did unless he was sure he would have gotten out again. Nothing in that house could have been more important than Her Majesty’s spymaster. There was something he hadn’t accounted for—some kind of machination, an unexpected enemy.

A trap.

Ferdinand waited for the dahlias to contribute to the conversation. They did not. They sat silent and darkly luminescent, shimmering and iridescent like a sunlit oil slick.

Dorothea found Ferdinand riding in the arena at a canter. Ophelia picked up on his own ragged anxiety, and she was having trouble pulling herself together, resulting in a rough, disconnected gait. He dropped down to a trot, going to a two-point seat to find his leg position again, before he migrated into an awkward, bouncy post.

By the time he came down to a walk, he saw Dorothea watching him from the viewing area, a ladle in hand still dripping with water from the nearby basin. Reluctantly, he steered in her direction.

“I know…you and Edie had an argument after the meeting.” She nervously quirked her lip to the side. “I mean, everyone knows. You two weren’t quiet.”

“Perhaps that’s why the arena’s empty,” he said. By now, he was sure the whole palace had heard about him and the Emperor yelling at each other. Surely the headsmen were taking bets on who was about to become politically inconvenient. Ferdinand accepted the ladle of water she offered, then ran a washcloth over his face. “It is only natural, when one person is planning a rescue and the other is planning a funeral.”

Dorothea let out a long breath, her hand moving to awkwardly brush some of the dirt off her bodice.

“I’m sure the Prime Minister storming off to the stables didn’t clear the entire place,” she said to Ferdinand, who stood in an empty arena during a time of day where it was usually filled with nobles, soldiers, and trainers, all working in careful tandem with each other.

He took a drink, the cool water washing down the dry, cracked feeling in his throat. “Hubert isn’t dead. I’ve looked at his maps and notes. He believed there to be a…Slitherer stronghold in the Red Canyon, based on recent sightings of demonic beasts over the last few months and our time at Gareg Mach. We never found it when we were in school, before the war, but we both know how good Hubert’s instincts are.” It was true that Hubert employed a rich and competent spy network; although the depth of it was likely exaggerated simply due to Hubert’s own natural foresight. “I’m sure it’s there.”

Dorothea reached out to his shoulder, and Ferdinand did his best not to shy away. He didn’t want to be comforted. He wanted _action_. “Ferdinand, even if it is there, and even if he’s alive, there’s no guarantee that that’s where he’s being held.”

“It’s _something_ , though.”

“Ferdinand, Edelgard has ordered everyone to stay in Enbarr until Byleth arrives for the funeral. Prime Minister or not, you are still her general,” Dorothea spoke carefully, voice gentle, like he might explode.

Ferdinand shook his head. He adjusted his seat, and Ophelia shifted her weight. Not long ago, Hubert stood where Dorothea was, handing Ferdinand a towel and leveling a critic’s opinion of Ferdinand’s lead changes. “Everyone has already buried him, and we do not even have a body.”

“I can see why you feel that way. Maybe we’re all just too accustomed to loss.” Her face fell, and she leaned forward onto the railing. “Please, Edie needs you right now. I don’t know what this is going to do to her. Hubert was her retainer since she was a child. He was probably the only person she felt she could really trust. With him gone…she doesn’t seem distraught to us, but there’s a storm inside. I can feel it.”

_“He never would have given up on you like this!”_

_“Bold words, from someone who has never lost anything.”_

Ferdinand cringed, taking another sip of water. “I don’t think I’m the right person to help.”

“You both miss him,” Dorothea said. “There’s no shame in that.”

Ferdinand was staring down at Ophelia’s withers, where his hand held the reins while his other stroked her. A drop of water landed on her mane, then another landed on his hand. He blinked, and more came, and his eyes started to sting as dust from the arena mixed with his tears. He wiped at his face and hoped Dorothea didn’t see, even as he was sure she had, curses.

“Just, please don’t do anything rash,” Dorothea started, shifting awkwardly on her feet. “I wanted to come make sure you were okay. Edie…we all need you, Ferdinand. Now more than ever.” When he only looked up and nodded, then turned his head away again, Ophelia snorting anxiously underneath him, Dorothea turned to leave. “I know I haven’t always been welcoming to you, but if you need to talk…I’m here. I miss him, too.”

Ferdinand wished her well as she left, and started at a walk again, his eyes still wet. He thought he was done with crying, but now he was glad the arena was empty.

Because he did miss Hubert. Even when they were at each other’s throats, Hubert had been a constant presence for Ferdinand, starting during their time at the monastery and continuing through the war. As they grew closer, he’d come to expect Hubert’s sharp pessimism at important strategy meetings, or a pillar of black magic boiling a man who’d been about to drive a sword through Ferdinand’s gut. Near the end of the war, it had blossomed into something else—something quiet and firm as obsidian that Ferdinand could reach out and touch and hold, and that even began to touch and hold him back.

He had to admit, it _could_ be gone. Ferdinand knew that death was sudden, and permanent, and painful. He wasn’t naïve, despite what Edelgard probably thought after their last argument.

Ferdinand bit his lip.

What if he did find the den he was looking for? What if he ran his quarry to ground and tore every last lab or crypt or library slithering in the darkness apart and still found no trace of Hubert. Would he have to admit it, then? Would he have to admit he was losing his mind to his own optimism?

Ferdinand brought Ophelia to a stop, glanced out at the distant sun. She stomped a hoof when a fly landed on her shoulder.

Would the rest of his life be any better for not trying?

Ferdinand, as he had for the last several nights, went to the stables just before the break of dawn. Although this time, he came outfitted with his greaves and pauldrons, and came bearing a silver lance tightly wrapped in a course, tan fabric he’d grabbed from his room. He didn’t think the grooms would tell anyone where he’d gone until it was too late to stop him, but he liked the veneer of deniability.

Instead of grabbing his light exercise saddle, he began outfitting Ophelia for long distance travel. He would need to move quickly, so her full set of armor wasn’t an option, though he planned to dismount long before he encountered combat.

“Going somewhere?”

Ferdinand cringed against his horse’s saddle. When he looked up, he saw Edelgard standing not ten feet away.

Instead of her imperial garb, she was dressed in a simple black outfit—black boots, black breeches, a loose, dark tunic that he was sure hid all sorts of armor and daggers. She wore Amyr on her back, though the glow from the relic was masked with a tight wrap of dark cloth. Her hair was bound up and out of the way into a single tight bun, her horned coronet nowhere in sight. Anyone who did not know her wouldn’t think she was royalty. They wouldn’t even give her a second glance if not for her sweet face or shock of silvery blonde hair, and even at that, she passed well for a mercenary.

A true sort of shame filled him. Although it was very noble to abscond in the night to go rescue his beloved, it was highly _ignoble_ to abandon his post.

Edelgard made an expression that reminded Ferdinand more of a disappointed schoolteacher than the leader of Fodlan preparing to levy charges against a wayward soldier. “Are you committing treason in broad daylight?”

“Do not be ridiculous, Edelgard,” Ferdinand replied, checking the tightness of the girth. “This is clearly mutiny.”

He knew it was a bold thing to say, but he hoped the resolve shone through in his voice. Edelgard pinned her hands behind her back and strode closer to him, placing a hand on Ophelia as she did so.

“Well,” Edelgard said, as she began to tighten his saddle bags. “It can’t be mutiny if I go with you.”

Ferdinand opened, and then closed his mouth again. He imagined he rather resembled a fish. “You’re coming with me?”

“Hope is dangerous for me, Ferdinand,” said Edelgard, squaring her shoulders to face him. “I’d rather cry my tears than lash against the inevitable.”

Her face twisted, and Ferdinand tentatively reached for her shoulder before she stepped away. Whatever she felt, she smothered the feeling by running a hand over her face. “But I owe him this much. You really, truly think he may be alive?”

Ferdinand nodded. “I cannot explain how I know but I do. I may be wrong, I may be in denial, but I cannot stay here in Enbarr if there is even the slightest chance. He didn’t die to get some papers, and he did not die for me.”

The last few words tumbled out of him like river rocks spilling out of a bucket.

Her brow furrowed. “Is that your only reason? That you don’t think he would die for you?”

The question took Ferdinand aback. Doubt crept in like a serpent around his heels, and his stomach threatened to turn as he took in deep breaths. Was that it? That he didn’t think Hubert would have died for him?

Edelgard moved into his space again, voice quiet. “His feelings for you were deep.”

Of course, he’d known Hubert would always put Edelgard first. When they lay with their fingers entwined in Ferdinand’s tent while they kissed away the sound of bodies being removed from the field. When they sat and had tea or coffee, and Hubert would grace him with a rare, genuine smile that made Ferdinand feel like Count Vestra might, just _might_ return the depth of his affection. It wasn’t all he thought about, but it wasn’t lost on him that he was second even in this, and that for once, he was fine with it. Because it meant he got to touch Hubert whenever he wanted, it meant that understanding and respect could translate into intimacy.

“It is true that if he had, that would be a very hard burden for me to carry,” he said at last. “But no, that is not my reason. I believe he is alive because I remember looking up at the windowsill and expecting him to follow. I do not know if he turned away or simply vanished, I was falling and my eyes were not good enough. Where there is doubt for me, I cannot have anything except hope, Edelgard.”

Behind Edelgard, a young groom emerged with her horse. Ajax was a cute strawberry roan with clipped feathering on the hooves to make travel easier. Ferdinand and Hubert had argued about whether the gelding would be suitable for Her Majesty, before Hubert had finally relented by saying that if Ajax ended up bucking her off in the middle of battle, he’d turn _Ferdinand_ into glue.

“But Edelgard,” he said, “surely it would be better to send someone else. If you were captured—”

She shook her head. “You know Those Who Slither can imitate people. Assume you find a Hubert down there. How will you know if it’s really him until he slips a dagger between your ribs?” At Ferdinand’s hesitation, she continued. “I’m the only one who would be able to tell the real Hubert from a fake.”

Ferdinand had no choice but to accept that logic. He knew little of the struggle against Those Who Slither, at least the one that took place in the shadows with code words and deceptions.

“Now,” Edelgard said, “you have three day’s ride to convince me we are not on a fool’s errand.”

They rode from Enbarr to a small city near the Red Canyon. Even so close to the former monastery, habitation was sparse. Locals whispered of hauntings and curses from ages past, and not many people were willing to live so close to it. The appearance of demonic beasts in recent years had only further discouraged habitation.

They left their horses on a small farm at the edge of the nearest town. The man there was well compensated and deferential to the imperial seal Edelgard brought with them. He did not seem to recognize her, preferring instead to deal with Ferdinand; a couple times, he did not even seem to acknowledge direct questions she asked. Once, he even asked Ferdinand about his “guide”. Although Ferdinand knew he stood out a bit more at the moment, the experience of having someone focus on him and disregard her was nearly uncanny. If it bothered Edelgard, she didn’t make an issue of it, and when she and Ferdinand spent the night in the barn before moving on, she laid down on her plain bedroll without complaint.

None of that surprised Ferdinand. Or should have. Edelgard was a competent soldier, who cared little for the trappings of nobility when they didn’t serve her ends. He knew from the war that comfort was easily secondary to her. Still, it surprised him to see her so easily accept the absence of it.

Ferdinand turned in his bedroll for an hour, seemingly unable to calm his heart or soothe his mind. What would they find in the canyon? Where would they even begin to look? He thought of Hubert, and that made his heart race. The thought of having him back filled Ferdinand with a kind of deep ache.

“Can’t sleep?” Edelgard asked from his left.

Ferdinand let out a heavy breath. “Apologies. I am very nervous about what we will find. If anything.” After a beat, he added, “Can you not sleep, Edelgard?”

Her shoulders shook in what looked like tears before he realized she was laughing. She turned onto her back. “Sleep and I have a complicated relationship.”

Ferdinand could understand that. Edelgard’s dedication was unmatched, and he acknowledged the weight of the burden she carried. Honestly, it reminded him a great deal of Hubert, who viewed food and sleep as necessary inconveniences, and skirted both as much as possible. “Edelgard, I have a question.”

“Hm?”

“Our host was very rude to you,” Ferdinand said. “Did that not rankle you?”

“Why would it? I’m in disguise.”

He raised an eyebrow. “You are wearing _different clothes_.”

“And I look all the plainer compared to you. People see what they expect to see, and right now it serves me best to be your hunting guide, o’ noble lord.”

He smiled. “You sound like Hubert.”

She shrugged. “As much as I would have loved to muster an army, if Hubert has been captured and alive, he’ll be safer if they don’t know we’re coming. The leader of a united Fodlan announcing her arrival wouldn’t accomplish that.”

Ferdinand flushed. No, and they’d discussed it as they rode our of Enbarr. Even a group larger than the two of them may turn too many eyes, and they would not be able to travel as quickly. Stealth was essential, though it was not exactly Ferdinand’s strongest suit.

They lay in silence for a time after that, trying to sleep, until Edelgard rolled onto her side again, facing Ferdinand.

“Earlier this week, you asked me something.”

Ferdinand struggled to remember. They’d had a good many discussions that week—some of them highly unpleasant. “What was that?”

“You asked me if I wished it had been you instead of Hubert. The answer I gave wasn’t wholly true.” Her voice sounded quiet.

Ferdinand braced himself.

Edelgard continued. “I wished it had been me.”

Ferdinand tried to smother the surprise he felt, followed by a wave of sadness. “You cannot mean that.”

The two of them had been mourning or missing Hubert for a week. Hubert without Edelgard was a bitter draught to imagine. She was his most important person, not to mention the deep turmoil that would fall across Fodlan if she died before unification was solidified, worst of all if she died without naming an heir. “You are his everything. He spends every day ready to die if you should just ask it of him.”

Ferdinand fought that minor jealousy threatening to eat at him. That had always been part of his relationship with Hubert; there were times the knowledge still stung.

She shook her head. “Do you think I asked him to do that? I wish more than anything that I had the freedom to die for those I love, rather than constantly worrying about sending them to the slaughter. Hubert was my oldest friend. I—” she broke off. “You too, Ferdinand. I’ve buried so many people already. I can’t imagine losing both of you at once. All of this is for me. The price should be mine, no one else’s, but it _never_ is.”

Ferdinand sat in silence for some time. He’d spent the week wrestling with the idea that Hubert had died, had made a mistake, had lost the moment of time he needed to live by ensuring Ferdinand was safe. It was a terrible burden, and Ferdinand ached to think how it would have torn him apart if he thought Hubert dead.

Edelgard carried that all the time. Ferdinand knew she had no confidants outside of the Black Eagle Strike Force—and all of them lived precarious lives. That her dearest friends were also her most trusted warriors meant she constantly risked the loss of the only people who could comfort her.

“Does that surprise you?” She asked, tentatively.

Ferdinand sat up. “The only thing surprising to me is that…you don’t think you would do just fine without me.”

Edelgard regarded him. “If I haven’t conveyed how important you are to the empire—or how important you are to me—the fault rests with me.”

“Never, Your Majesty.” The response didn’t feel sufficient.

Ferdinand wished her good night, and curled away to try and get some sleep, even as the conversation continued to churn in his mind.

They descended into the canyon that morning, just as the sun cut over the horizon. It was tedious, risky work, with uncertain paths cutting across steep cliffsides. Once, Ferdinand’s footing wasn’t secure, and Edelgard’s crest-born strength kept him from plummeting to a very likely death.

At the base of the canyon, Ferdinand washed his face in the river running through the rock and dirt. Linhardt said that, over time, water could cut through stone. It didn’t make much sense to Ferdinand, but he was grateful for the cool water after their treacherous climb.

Edelgard placed her hand on his shoulder. He looked up to speak to her, but saw she had a finger raised to her lips in a signal to be quiet.

That was when he felt the light thunder in the ground. The sensation of something heavy moving nearby, step by step, each one loud enough to make the rocks at his feet tremble against each other. Following her gesture, he saw a dark shape moving through the dense underbrush framing the river.

Ferdinand’s heart raced as they waited for the demonic beast to either notice them or not. His throat dried, and he imagined that enormous golden mask turning to face them as strange joints—neither animal nor human—popped and contorted in preparation to fight them.

But it did not, and the beast moved on. By the time he looked back to Edelgard, her expression had changed.

“Should we find it?” Ferdinand asked. “Take it by surprise?”

“Why fight it when we could follow it?” Edelgard replied, giving Ferdinand a camaraderie tap on the shoulder as she rose to her feet, hand braced against Amyr’s handle. She moved onwards, her jaw set in a hard line.

Edelgard tore into the line of mages like a torrential storm, and two were dead before they could respond, Amyr leaving burning gashes in their stomachs that filled the air with a smell like cooking blood. A third raised his arms to bring lighting upon her, but the strike missed, instead hitting an apparatus to her left that caused glass to shatter and black miasma to crackle through the air.

Ferdinand pulled his lance free from the archer’s stomach and then moved, pirouetting around Edelgard’s back and going for the last remaining mage. He thrust his lance into the man’s stomach, not even hesitating for the pop of flesh splitting or the crack of bones giving way to softer tissue underneath.

Behind him, Edelgard met a heavily armored guard. It may have been bad, as she was not in her own armor, but she made up for it with agility. When he raised his heavy sword over her head, she slid to the side, smoothly and evasively. As she did, she picked up speed with her relic and was able to bring it down on the crook between her attacker’s pauldrons and helmet.

She didn’t quite decapitate him, but as Ferdinand watched the guard bleed out and Edelgard’s axe stick in flesh and torn armor as she tried to remove it, he could tell it was a very near thing.

The two of them stood, panting. Madly, Edelgard looked back to Ferdinand with the kind of relief he only ever saw in her eyes after a battle, or holding her wife’s hand. She always looked glad to be alive, and even happier to be triumphant.

After reassuring himself that she was okay, Ferdinand began to move down the twisted hallways of the ancient, modified crypt. Coffins were tables, and a trip down a long hallway revealed that the local slitherers had turned antechambers lined with sarcophagi into cells. He and Edelgard searched one after the other, Edelgard lifting a lantern she’d appropriated from the lab while Ferdinand let his eyes adjust to the darkness. A few of the cells were full. People with red lines radiating from their hands and throats would reach out through the bars, grasping at Edelgard and Ferdinand. Their eyes were wide, unfocused. A couple retreated behind the coffins in their cells and yelled from the back of the rooms.

Ferdinand smothered down a rising sickness. “What were they doing do these people?”

“They were trying to implant them with crests.” Edelgard’s voice sounded far away.

He opened his mouth to ask her how she knew that, but instead his eyes trailed back around to a full cell, an empty cell. As they approached the end of the hallway, he wasn’t sure if he was still praying to find Hubert, or that they _wouldn’t_ find him. Not here, not knowing what had been done to him. He’d spent the last week wondering if Hubert was alive or dead—the idea that there might not be enough left of him to recognize either of them filled him with horrible dread. With every step, Ferdinand’s heart fell further, and pain that he’d smothered with optimism threatened to boil over to the surface.

At the very end of the hallway was a large, dark cell. Instead of a crypt, it looked to simply be another hallway that had been bricked off and sealed with iron bars.

Ferdinand’s heart was in his throat as he knelt down by the bars and tried to make out the figure resting against the wall. He saw dark, matted hair and pale skin first, and it wasn’t until he saw the singed and torn garb of the inhabitant that he called out, “Edelgard! Come quickly.”

She ran over, the oil from the lamp in her hands sloshing as she fell to her knees on the stones.

At the light from the lamp, Hubert raised his eyes.

Ferdinand let out a cry, and next to him, Edelgard went completely silent. She felt around, eagerness guiding her hands as she tugged at the bars. Ferdinand caught a hint of her crest of flame coming to life, and the bars groaned, but the lock didn’t give. “Do you see a key anywhere?”

Ferdinand gasped. “I think I saw one on one of the mages. I’ll be right back.” He sprinted off, hands shaking as he looted the shredded corpse, his own boots becoming stained with the drying pool of blood left in Edelgard’s wake.

By the time he returned down the hallway, Hubert had crawled over to where Edelgard was, as if they had been whispering to each other. Ferdinand saw Edelgard’s shoulders shaking. She turned to face him, her expression one of overwhelming joy as tears streamed down her jaw. “It’s him. It’s Hubert. He’s alive.”

Ferdinand let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding, and he began clumsily working through the set of keys. He filed his way through them until one, finally, opened the cell. He threw the door aside, running in to collapse at Hubert’s knees and gather him up. Hubert flinched, looking stunned, and he made a pained noise when Ferdinand’s arms wrapped around his shoulders. His shoulder did not look dislocated, but it was extremely tender and swollen under Hubert’s dirtied jacket. Ferdinand apologized, instead cupping Hubert’s jaw in his hands. Hubert, exhausted, blinked at Ferdinand as his head lolled to the side. Ferdinand saw a series of needle marks at the cusp of his collar, horrible inflamed vessels spread out in starbursts from each one.

His stomach churned. Edelgard, right behind him, settled to his left, herself reaching out to take Hubert’s hand. “I’m so sorry, Hubert. I’m so sorry—”

Her hand fell over Ferdinand’s. Hubert’s unfocused gaze flitted between the two of them.

His eyes rolled back in his head. He went limp in Ferdinand’s arms, and Ferdinand lurched forward to catch him. For a terrible moment, he thought Hubert too quiet, too still, and it wasn’t until Edelgard said that they needed to get moving that he realized he’d simply gone unconscious.

Ferdinand helped Edelgard carry Hubert out of the canyon. The climb was even more treacherous than the descent, but Ferdinand burned with newfound energy, motivated by the feeling of Hubert against him. He’d lost him and found him again. Despite the ache in Ferdinand’s bones, he pushed onwards.

Ferdinand threw more wood in the stove and heated water on the hot surface. In the darkest corner of the room, Edelgard whispered to Hubert as she placed a cool cloth on his forehead. He’d not regained consciousness since they found him, and Ferdinand hung helplessly around the fringes as she cared for her retainer. He fetched blankets, or water, but neither of them would be very much help until the healers arrived.

Ferdinand wanted nothing more than to stay at Hubert’s bedside, holding his hand. The fever in them made him worry that if he did, Hubert would boil up and disappear.

So instead, Ferdinand made tea. He waited by the stove. He tried not to hear the things Edelgard was whispering to Hubert—sometimes affairs of state, or gossip. Other times, she’d weave in little details about their childhoods that felt inappropriate for Ferdinand to hear like this.

“The nearest wyvern squadron should be here by tomorrow morning,” he said. “And they are bringing a healer with them.” He wasn’t sure what the healer would be able to help with, as it wasn’t clear what had even been _done_ to Hubert.

Edelgard shook her head. “I hope this fever clears before then. He’s burning up.” She swallowed. “I’ve seen it before…those that take a fever like this. If it doesn’t come down soon…”

“He could still die?” Ferdinand fought a wave of overwhelming helplessness.

Edelgard nodded. “That, or the fever could burn his mind away.”

A kind of rising horror landed with every word, and Ferdinand pressed his head into his hands, curling around his little seat by the stove. “We did not find him just to lose him.”

He saw tears in her eyes. He was sure he’d seen Edelgard cry more this week than he ever had. There were times it hadn’t even seemed possible, like her heart and eyes were made of stone. “If we do, he will have died with people who care for him.”

“Please do not say that.” Ferdinand brushed his own tears away. That he thought would be unbearable. All week, he’d clung to hope. He didn’t know what it would do to him to have that shattered.

“Ferdinand,” Edelgard said, “thank you.”

“For what?” he asked.

“I’ve lost a good many people,” she said, her voice shaking as she threaded her words carefully. “You are the only person ever to return one to me.”

Ferdinand dared a glance at Hubert, whose eyes would occasionally flutter open and shut.

“Now,” Edelgard said, speaking with confidence, like she knew what to expect and what needed to be done, “please go ask the innkeeper for more linens and a change of clothes for him. We have a long night ahead of us.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is Chapter 2! It is here! It has arrived. The fic is now going to be three chapters, because I realize I bit off quite a bit and there was more I wanted to wrap up.
> 
> Amazing thanks to [GoldenThreads](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldenThreads/) who beta'd for me this chapter and was absolutely spectacular. I realized I was in trouble when my original planned ending wasn't working anymore and she helped me untangle it. And caught my typos/word echoes. Just, hella shout out.
> 
> Specific content warnings for this chapter include:  
> \- high fevers/sickness  
> \- sleep deprivation  
> \- sickness/wound care  
> \- general torture aftermath

Edelgard snaked her arms behind Hubert’s neck and shoulders to lift him off the bed. He tilted limply into her, his sweat-soaked brow leaving a dark imprint on the crook of her shoulder. Behind them, Ferdinand clumsily laid down a dry sheet. He’d seen the healers operate—they made quick work of bandages and linens alike, and Ferdinand couldn’t claim to have their talents as his fingers struggled to lay the fabric flat.

“We’ll need to get him out of these,” Edelgard said. Since they’d found Hubert, her voice had taken on the confident edge he remembered from the war—the voice of someone who knew what needed to be done and how it should be done. He knew this Edelgard best.

Ferdinand nodded, reaching out to the buckles of Hubert’s torn jacket, cringing at how it was caked with _ something _ . To her genuine and infinite credit, Edelgard did not comment on how steady his hands became. They were suspiciously sure and familiar with the workings under them even as he hesitated, afraid of what he might find underneath this time.

As soon as Ferdinand slid his fingers under the coat to remove it, Hubert started shivering. His pale green eyes opened into slits, and the force of his coming back into wakefulness startled Edelgard. He weakly tried to pull away from her, lifting his hand to loosely latch his fingers around Ferdinand’s wrist. Like the rest of him, they were coated in sweat and hiding sickly heat underneath. He looked down, inky black magic scars trailing up from the tips of his fingers, following their path over Ferdinand’s own pink skin.

“It’s cold,” Hubert said, the word hissing out as his torso shook violently. Ferdinand froze, unsure of how to proceed. “And hot.”

“You will be resting again in a minute,” Edelgard said into Hubert’s ear, voice calm as she pressed her forehead and nose into his temple. “A clean shirt will be more comfortable.”

“No, not again,” he managed, voice a low croak. Dazed, he tried to pull away from her. “I promised—”

“You kept it for a decade, and I would do this a thousand times for you.” She forced his head back into hers. Ferdinand felt as though he was watching something unbearably intimate—something Hubert wouldn’t remember, and a side of Edelgard that she rarely showed. “Hubert, please let me help you.”

It said a great deal about how weak Hubert was that he obliged, his unfocused eyes fluttering as he struggled to stay conscious. Ferdinand managed to remove the sleeve closest to Edelgard before going for the second one, and seeing Hubert bolt upright in pain, hissing as Ferdinand found the source of the swelling.

“Edelgard,” Ferdinand said, voice dead serious but steeped with the kind of panic and guilt he always felt when one of his allies was hurt and he could do nothing for them. “His arm…it has been dislocated—or perhaps broken—and then healed many times. It is very swollen.”

She nodded. “Go fetch the innkeeper. See if she has some shears we may be able to borrow. Get some bone broth as well, I want to see if he can drink something while he’s awake.”

Hubert’s breathing fell back into a slow but uneven cadence as he rested uncomfortably against her.

Ferdinand obliged, leaving the boiling heat of that room. As soon as he closed the door behind him, he pressed his back against the frame. His legs started to give out from under him, and he slumped halfway to the floor. He tried to count backwards how long he’d been awake and couldn’t compose a number.

Ferdinand wiped tears from his eyes and took a few calming breaths—just like Manuela taught the students to do when they were at the academy. Shears and bone broth. Not a moment more to spare.

Ferdinand nudged his way back through the door, a cool iron pot in one hand and a pair of scissors in the other. He hesitated at the threshold, afraid of what he might see. He hadn’t been gone longer than fifteen minutes. Surely Hubert couldn’t have died in the time it took him to go downstairs and come back. Surely Edelgard would have called out to him.

As he stepped back through the door, Edelgard, still holding Hubert, glared at him. “What took you so long?”

“The woman had gone to bed,” Ferdinand lied, and placed the pot on the nightstand near Edelgard. He stood up, scissors in hand. He sat down on the other side of the bed, quickly placing the scissors between Hubert’s tightened sleeve and his bruised wrist. When Ferdinand lifted Hubert’s arm, a jolt went through him like he’d been shocked, and he flinched, the scissors slipping from under the fabric. Ferdinand cursed, and went to try again before Edelgard gently placed her hand at his wrist.

“I’ll do it,” she said.

Ferdinand jolted backwards, hot anger flooding through him. “I  _ can do it _ .”

“You’re shaking,” Edelgard kept her voice even. “You should hold him for a moment. My back is sore.”

Ferdinand looked down at his hand holding the scissors to see that it was indeed shaking under Edelgard’s steely grip, his fingers struggling with the handles.

“Oh,” he said, “I am sorry, Edelgard. I am so tired.”

“I know. I am too,” she said. Ferdinand left the scissors in place before moving around the bed to replace her at Hubert’s side.

She lifted Hubert easily, one hand supporting his head as Ferdinand took the seat that had been hers. Hubert sank into him, offering a mild shivering fit at the change. Ferdinand grasped him with one hand under his ribs. His other pressed Hubert’s cheek into his own. He willed some of that unnatural heat to bleed from Hubert into him. He wanted to soak it out of him, take the illness in through his own skin.

“Ferdinand?” Hubert said, his eyes opening enough for Ferdinand to see how bleary and glassy they looked.

“I am here, Hubert,” Ferdinand whispered. “Edelgard is going to move your arm in a second. It will hurt.”

Hubert made a grunt that sounded vaguely like assent, and Edelgard straightened his arm to begin cutting his sleeve off.

Even with a sharp pair of shears, it was difficult, tedious work. Occasionally, she twisted his arm wrong and he’d hiss, drawing closer into Ferdinand. When she got to the plated armor at the top of his shoulder, Edelgard swore, and had no choice but to begin cutting upwards from the bottom seam near Hubert’s hip, though it would have been easier to cut straight through the collar. Edelgard discarded the ruined jacket.

Against Ferdinand, Hubert had slipped back into unconsciousness, and no longer jerked every time Edelgard jostled his arm. This time his breathing stayed a little more even. Ferdinand sank into that feeling, looked at it as a sign of hope.

It reminded him of sleeping next to Hubert at night in his quarters. The routine mostly involved Ferdinand draping himself over Hubert’s back. Sometimes Hubert pressed up against him, his arm wrapped tightly around Ferdinand’s hip to keep him close. Ferdinand never felt safer than he did on those nights, with the Emperor’s spymaster nosing his hair and snoring very lightly.

Eventually, she was able to pull the dirtied mess away, revealing his loose, sweat-soaked undershirt. Fortunately, it was easy work for Ferdinand to unlatch the buttons, and Edelgard was able to maneuver it off Hubert’s hurt arm without trouble.

Ferdinand’s stomach turned when he saw the full extent of the damage.

Hubert’s right shoulder down to his hand was swollen and red, the skin inflamed as the muscles, joints, and ligaments all responded to recent trauma and subsequent healing. Although a quick search implied the bones were intact, they wouldn’t know for sure until a healer arrived. The worst bruise of all hovered over Hubert’s shoulder, a mess of blue and green implying that it had been dislocated and replaced  _ without _ healing to ease the recovery.

Ferdinand couldn’t take his eyes off the wound. He almost understood Those Who Slither subjecting Hubert to their twisted experiments, or even to more regimented forms of torture—Ferdinand loathed those that had done it to him, but it was a hazard in espionage. It was Those Who Slither doing…what they did. Whenever Hubert left for his Work—the cloak and dagger kind that Ferdinand could not follow him to—they both always knew that was a likely outcome of capture. Ferdinand wasn’t happy about it, nor was he surprised that it had happened. What had been done to Hubert’s shoulder, however, was a sign of pure, angry brutality.

He found some small comfort when he remembered that the torturers were dead, and that he and Edelgard had killed them.

Ferdinand then saw the remains of exposure located at even junctures along his back, arms, neck, and shoulders. It was like someone had injected bright red ink into his veins, and at each site the body responded by inflaming and isolating the contaminated vessels. What remained was a vascular starburst of bright red, each about two inches in diameter across.

Edelgard saw Ferdinand tracing the path of the needle marks. “They have to poison the body before they try to implant the crest, so it won’t be rejected.”

Ferdinand looked to her. “How do you know all this?”

“I’ve been reading Hubert’s reports.” He could have sworn she rushed through the words, like she couldn’t get them out of her mouth quickly enough. She shook out the clean shirt before carefully beginning to work his arm into it. “Mostly theories. This confirms a lot of them.”

“Does he…have a crest now?” Ferdinand asked. Even without a crest, Hubert made a powerful warlock. With one, those that hurt him were lucky to have died at Edelgard’s hand instead.

Edelgard shook her head. “It takes months of treatments for them to try. Most don’t survive or stay sane long enough to reach the final stage.”

“That’s madness,” Ferdinand said, his hands working quickly to draw the shirt down Hubert’s front, covering up the various traumas of his body. “It cannot possibly be worth it.”

“Statistically, no,” Edelgard said.

“Maybe they thought he had a good chance of accepting a crest because of his magic?” Ferdinand proposed, a trace of hopefulness hovering over the words.

At that, Edelgard offered a bitter laugh. “It’s more likely that they wanted to drop his body at the steps of the imperial palace covered in the signs that they tried. As a gift for me.”

A chill went down Ferdinand’s back. He imagined what it would have been like to awaken from one of his now restless nights to a commotion in the palace. Guards would have been mobilized as he dressed and made his way to the war room. He wondered if Edelgard would have had them bring Hubert there, for everyone to see, for her to stand in the same room with her loss and shame.

Or maybe Hubert would have been discovered by some guards early in the morning, just as Ferdinand usually brought his grief to the stables. As the only official awake to respond, would he have run out to the steps, been the first to find the body? Would Ferdinand have cradled Hubert in his arms and sobbed at the horrors that had been done to him? Curse Edelgard’s name for not listening to him?

Her fist clenched in the sheets. “You were right Ferdinand. I gave up on him.”

Those words snapped him out of his dark reverie. Back to the world where, for the moment, Hubert was braced against them, still breathing, and not yet cold—quite the contrary, it seemed his skin got hotter every hour.

“Edelgard…”

She squeezed her eyes shut, before rising and grasping for the pot of cool broth. She took a cup sitting next to it and poured a sour looking draft. “This will be truly disgusting, but if he can keep it down it’ll help.”

Ferdinand did his best to urge Hubert back to wakefulness, and his eyes blinked open again long enough for Edelgard to hold the porcelain to his chapped lips. She spoke gently, as she would have to a sibling. She tilted the cup and he took two hearty sips before coughing on the rest, and they decided it was enough.

Finally, almost reluctantly, Ferdinand laid Hubert back down on the bed. He sank back into the pillow, his eyes closing again. Deftly, Ferdinand soaked another cloth in the cool basin of water near the bed and laid it on his forehead.

“Edelgard,” Ferdinand tried again, while she continued to disregard him and stirred the liquid.

“What?” she snapped. “What could you possibly say to make this better?”

“Nothing. But I want to remind you that I could have been wrong and dragged my Emperor into a den of vipers for no reason.” He went on, something hot filling his eyes. “If you had given up on him, you never would have come with me. You would have had me arrested before I could leave Enbarr. You would not have travelled three days and journeyed into a canyon on the mere chance that we might find him alive. You are not giving up on him  _ now _ , when he is sick.”

She stared at him, the cup shuddering in her hands.

Ferdinand continued. “You wanted to protect yourself, Edelgard, but you did not give up on him.”

Edelgard shook her head. “That is kind of you to say. If I had listened sooner, we could have arrived before the worst of it.”

“And if I felt so strongly,” Ferdinand replied, “I could have left a week ago.”

She pressed the palm of her hand into her forehead. Her laugh sounded born of exhaustion and lacked any musical quality. “Are you really arguing with me about whether or not I’m to blame?”

“Edelgard, sometimes things do just happen. I admit I was frustrated that you were not listening to me, but none of  _ this _ is your fault.”

She slumped forward in her chair, her head resting on her arms. A few strands of hair had come loose, and hung over her wrists.

“You should sleep, Ferdinand,” she said, her voice sounding far away.

“In a minute.” Ferdinand got two more towels, dipped them in the water, and placed them on the sides of Hubert’s neck. He placed two more at Hubert’s wrists. Ferdinand wasn’t sure if it would really help bring the fever down, but it at least had to be more comfortable. Even as Hubert’s temperature seemed to climb ever higher.

When he looked back to Edelgard, she had fallen asleep in the chair with her forehead pressed against a nearby wall. Her supporting arms dangled to the side, and just looking at her position Ferdinand knew she would have some pains when she woke up. With the bed occupied, they were short on options.

Reflexively, Ferdinand got up and claimed one of the blankets sitting near the foot of the bed. Unfurling it, he carefully draped it around Edelgard’s shoulders and front. This was a risky maneuver, as there was a non-zero chance she would awaken and punch him in the throat on reflex (as Hubert had almost done once when Ferdinand startled him—he’d apologized for days for the accident). Instead, she sank further into the wall, her free hand rising instinctively to wrap the blanket tighter around herself.

Ferdinand smiled. Crest of Flames or not, it turned out she had her limits like anyone else.

Edelgard almost looked…peaceful. There’d been moments at the academy that she hadn’t been as grim as someone seven times her age, where she’d looked carefree, like an ordinary young woman instead of the heir to an empire. Once the war began, and Edelgard began her attacks on the Church of Seiros in earnest, those moments vanished almost entirely.

Witnessing her find a moment of calm despite the sadness and stress of the last few weeks brought Ferdinand some comfort.

He moved back to Hubert’s bedside to begin his long watch.

Ferdinand was tired. A week of grief and insomnia had eaten away at him, followed by a long ride and a fight below ground. The one time Ferdinand actually wanted a cup of coffee, there wasn't a bean to grind for miles. He kept watch by the bedside, his heart fluttering nervously every time the cadence of Hubert's breathing changed. Occasionally, he stirred in his sleep and pulled at the pillows elevating his injured arm, or dislodged the towels Ferdinand regularly soaked and laid over him to try and combat the damn fever.

He spoke occasionally, mostly nonsense. Once he awoke gasping for breath, saying that Edelgard had been taken and they had to rescue her. Ferdinand had cautiously helped him sit up and pointed to Edelgard sleeping in the corner of the room. His algae bloom eyes blearily acknowledged, and he'd allowed Ferdinand to lower him back to the bed.

He found himself dipping his forehead against Hubert's warm arm, and he'd snap awake after almost falling to the floor. He'd sit Hubert up, try to get him to have a little bit more broth. Sometimes he was successful–other times less so. He spent a good few minutes cleaning up a ceramic cup that shattered after Hubert frantically smacked it out of Ferdinand's hands before lapsing back into a sleep that was so deep he was almost impossible to awaken, and Ferdinand feared the end was near.

Until he awoke again, Edelgard once more at the forefront of his mind.

"They have her," Hubert said again, taking in hot breaths as he stared in abject horror at the ceiling.

Ferdinand pressed a hand into his sore eyes. "No one has her. We have been over this. Please rest."  _ Please recover _ .  _ I do not know what I will do if you don't _ .

"She's all right." As Ferdinand's words sunk in, Hubert's expression relaxed and he sank back into his pillow. His shoulders released some tension even as his stomach stayed so tightly wound that pressing him back to the bed was like pressing against a stone. He alternated between going completely limp and seeming ready to bolt at the nearest opportunity.

"I promised her," Hubert said. "She'd never have to care for me as she cared for them." His face fell in a look of absolute dejection and despair that Ferdinand didn't know he could make. That alone frightened him.

"Cared for who?" Ferdinand asked, bleary confusion lapping at the fringed edges of his mind. He knew Edelgard to care for many people–and always considered Hubert chief among them. "Hubert, that's a silly promise. You are her oldest friend. Of course she cares for you."

Hubert shook his head, and Ferdinand couldn't parse the next few words. "What are you trying to say?"

"To think I almost told." Shaking his head, Hubert sank back into his bed, and his shoulders shook in what Ferdinand grimly realized was a laugh. "'Care for.' Oh, Ferdinand, never change."

Just like that, Hubert closed his eyes again.

Ferdinand blinked.

He couldn’t shake the feeling Hubert had just awoken, found coherence, gently mocked him, and then passed out again. Perhaps it was a good sign. He doused a washcloth and swore about how he'd need to go fetch more water soon.

As he placed it back on Hubert's head, he let his hand linger on Hubert's burning cheek. It was impossible to gauge, and even sillier that Ferdinand kept checking every hour–as if he would be able to feel the signs of a rising or falling temperature with his bare hands. Manuela probably could. Linhardt maybe. Not Ferdinand.

A knot formed in his throat as he turned his hand inwards to Hubert's cheek, so his palm cradled it just by the shape of his jaw. Instinctively, he started stroking with his thumb, because there was nothing else to do, because it's what his mother used to do when she lived, and because he just wanted to touch him. Be there with him. It felt like every time Hubert progressed, gained a spark of recognition, he'd fall back asleep and it was a roulette whether he'd still have it when he woke up. And every time he woke, his disconnection grew worse.

"Hubert," Ferdinand started, keeping his voice low for Edelgard's sake as his other hand slipped down to Hubert's free hand. "Do you remember the tea we took in the city this spring, during the first hot day of the year?"

The silence was his only answer. He held onto Hubert's hand tighter with his own. Sinking his lips closer to Hubert's ear, he almost fell apart then and there at the heat radiating from him.

"You said you were calling me away for business and wouldn't tell me where we were going. Then you directed us down the river walk, and I remember looking at you in the shade, with the cool air coming off the water. I keep thinking about that moment because...I felt truly content. Like everything else had been worth it just for that moment."

He let out a sharp laugh that sounded more like a sob. "The place you took me to, full tea–but they served it chilled! In crystal glasses, can you imagine?"

He didn't have the time then to ponder whether it was sacrilege or not. He'd been so happy for the cool drink on a warm day. The feeling he'd had was one he'd experienced before–where he'd look at Hubert and a kind of intense happiness filled him. They traded barbs–blunted versions of their old squabbles, and occasionally Ferdinand said something that inspired Hubert to glance away, try to hide a little crooked smile under his bangs.

Ferdinand's eyes stung. Remembering Hubert then made it impossible not to transpose that contented, hale shape with the Hubert in front of him–the one hovering between an illness that might improve and one that would further sink its inky claws into him until there was nothing left.

"I fell in love with you then," Ferdinand finished, the words ripping out of him. It snuck up on him. It was a kind of love where he’d been looking at Hubert before being overcome with the intense feeling that he wanted to see him every day. That he loved the light curl in his dark bangs, the timber of his least bitter laugh. The hours they gathered between them during the week felt like they lasted forever, over tea and steeping coffee and good conversation. "I love you."

The tears flowed freely down his cheeks now, as hot as Hubert's forehead. "I knew you would not reciprocate, not completely, and I did not need you to.” He took in a shaking breath. “I was happy.”

“But I do need you to stay alive." He took Hubert's hand and kissed it. Did he imagine Hubert grasping back, however weakly? "Please just stay with me."

Ferdinand wasn’t so naïve that he thought words could restore life. If Hubert lived, he wouldn’t say his words were the cure. And if he died, he wouldn’t think it was because Ferdinand lacked feeling. They were, however, words he needed to say.

He said them a few more times before he finally laid his head by Hubert’s shoulder, sinking into the bed.

Hubert noticed the quiet first, followed by the slick chill of salty sweat soaking his clothes through—the remains of a broken fever. He flinched at the ache in his right arm. When he clenched his fist and the ligaments threatened to tear, he withheld a cry and let his arm fall back onto the nest of pillows keeping it lifted.

He was in a warm room—rustically built and lined with timbers, the light from a stove in the corner cast a gentle orange glow on everything. A log popped, and that sound was enough to conjure smoke that threatened to choke Hubert in place. He blinked away the sensation of heat searing at his skin and reassured himself that the low embers of the stove remained safely contained within the chassis.

He squeezed his eyes shut. His head still ached, but the pounding in his chest had finally, finally quieted. Rapid, uneven heartbeats had been his constant companion for weeks now, and if he was prone to tears, he might have been moved to them at the absence of that particular discomfort. He could not remember how he’d gotten there—or where there was, but he knew his body had won a foul bet. He remembered an incalculable amount of time in a dark cell. The alchemical burns on his back were not as sore as they had been against cold stones, but they hurt. He counted each sore spot for a named, known enemy and worked his way down the list until he could ignore the pain.

Next to him, a lump moved.

He was too tired to respond to a threat; all he did was turn his head. It was a good thing, because he knew the man warming his cheek all too well.

Ferdinand’s golden hair spread out across the bed as he leaned on his arms and Hubert’s shoulder. He let out little sleepy noises, occasionally shifting in his chair and falling further into Hubert. Hubert watched, attempting to puzzle out the truth. A vision of Ferdinand kneeling at eye level came to Hubert, and he vaguely remembered the feeling of hands holding him in place as he’d gazed back in disbelief. It bled into Ferdinand’s hair glowing in the brightness of a fire, and Hubert’s own hands reaching out to push him to safety.  _ “Hubert, why are you looking at me like that?” _

At the other end of the room, he had to squint to make out Edelgard—his lady, his Emperor—curled up in a wool blanket with her head pressed into the crook of a wall. Shocks of pale hair ran loose from a tight bun. The last time he saw her, he’d been in utter despair, watching her between the bars of a cage and not knowing which of them was the prisoner.

He wanted to rise, wanted to offer her the bed, but she slept without distress. He vowed not to take that from her, even though he felt a pinch of guilt at the sight of the Emperor of Adrestia sleeping in a chair near his bedside.

The fact that the mere thought of sitting up filled him with dread also contributed to his decision.

He thought about damning propriety and helping her into her dresses when the marks on her back were fresh. Hubert’s own hands had still been gangly—as yet untainted with either blood or dark magic, and he’d made promises to her beside ten identical graves. One of which he’d now broken.

Next to him, Ferdinand sank further into the crook of his neck. His hand was wrapped around Hubert’s—those long fingers were loosened in sleep, but they were still knitted together as if Ferdinand had been praying for the both of them. He always did this, always stole Hubert instead of the bed or blanket. A mild annoyance, ultimately.

He never thought he’d experience it again.

Hubert struggled to shift—he couldn’t move far—but he made more room for Ferdinand with his head, squeezed back weakly with his hand. He couldn’t press his body against him like he wanted to, hold him tight.

“ _ I love you _ .”

In the absence of fever, a chill set in, and Ferdinand was always warm.

“Words?”

“Is that really necessary?”

“We exchanged them while I was nearly unconscious. You have heard mine, but I do not remember yours.”

“Fine. Correspondence.”

“Malfeasance.”

“Signatory.”

“Foundry. A river runs red through Gareg Mach.”

“The sea outside Brigid is green.” Edelgard.

“Your Majesty…” Hubert’s voice hitched, raspy and agonized. “You should not have come.”

Edelgard’s response was lost as that last recognition thrummed a string somewhere inside of Ferdinand, spurring him fully into wakefulness. Hubert lay in front of him, his head awkwardly turned as truly abysmal black bangs fell over his right eye. Other than the bag under it, his left eye was clear, sparkling, and fixed on Ferdinand. He could just as easily have been awakening back home in Enbarr, if not for how ill Hubert looked in the early morning light. It was overcast outside, and it cast a silvery gray over the room as Ferdinand’s heart broke.

If a heart could break with joy.

Ferdinand flung himself onto Hubert, pressing their foreheads together as tears started flowing freely down his face. “You’re alive.”

“Technically, yes,” Hubert said, voice cracking. His left arm worked behind Ferdinand’s head, weakly knotted with his hair. And he kissed Ferdinand’s forehead more sweetly than he ever had before. He wanted to reject the madness of Hubert comforting him, but instead he sank into the warmth of that kiss. Everything from the last few days spilled out, like an overflowing pitcher.

“We killed them,” Ferdinand said into Hubert’s throat, shocked at the viciousness in him when he said it. “Every last one of them.”

Hubert said nothing but smiled against skin. “ _ The love language of House Vestra _ ,” Hubert had once joked as they stepped off the battlefield, still covered in the blood of an Alliance soldier that Ferdinand rushed to defend him from.

Ferdinand looked to Edelgard, who sat on the other side of Hubert’s bed, a small smile on her face, although she’d replaced the placid, evaluating mask. “I was sure we had lost you, old friend.”

“Your Majesty,” Hubert’s face twisted in confusion, and he laid back on the bed. Even the effort to embrace Ferdinand seemed to have taken a great deal out of him. “How long?”

“Two weeks,” Edelgard said. “Long enough. I assumed…”

Ferdinand barely caught the small, frantic headshake that Hubert sent in Edelgard’s direction. On reflex, she clamped her mouth shut, though Ferdinand saw her attention flicker towards him. He stared at Hubert, the slightest trace of hurt stabbing through his relief. He knew they kept secrets from him, but to see them flaunted stung.

“Two weeks of people thinking your lurching spymaster dead.” Hubert let out a disgusted sound. “Have the celebrations ceased yet?”

“Joke all you like. Everyone has been in mourning.” Edelgard pressed a finger to her temple, even though a smile pulled at the corner of her lips. Her eyes widened. “Byleth. Oh flames, she was alone in Almyra. She’s flying back for your funeral. She doesn’t know you’re alive. No one knows you’re alive.”

“Funeral?” A wicked little smile formed on Hubert’s lips. “Can we perhaps wait to tell everyone the good news? The chance to attend my own funeral is very appealing. I wonder if Caspar will cry. Has Dorothea prepared an aria? Perhaps I can burst out of my own coffin to shame those that aren’t wailing loudly enough.”

“I will not deceive our friends for one moment.” Edelgard crossed her arms. “The major newspapers in Enbarr have all published stirring eulogies. You’ll have to make do with those.”

Ferdinand gaped at Hubert, then back to Edelgard. “ _ How _ can you joke about this?”

Hubert rolled his attention back around, and the little trace of annoyance in the set of his jaw reassured Ferdinand. Next to him, Edelgard looked surprised at the serious tone, and she cocked her head in a little confused gesture.

The surprised looks from those dearest to Ferdinand made his shock drain away. At his expression, Hubert’s jaw loosened, and his own expression fell from irritation to sorrow. “Ferdinand, I am...sorry. This is my way.”

“Please forgive us, Ferdinand,” Edelgard said, her arms crossed on the other side of the bed.

“Everyone said you died in the fire.” He deflated, grasping for Hubert’s hand. His voice tore out of him, raw as he clutched at singed knuckles. “They all told me to move on, to be there with them in their grief but I could not.”

Hubert shook under him, and for his life Ferdinand wouldn’t have been able to decode the expression on his face.

“And we’re lucky you didn’t,” Edelgard said, keeping her expression flat even as her voice quivered. “Ferdinand, I hate to do this, but could you please go fetch some fresh water?”

Ferdinand grasped at Hubert’s wrist, his own pulse quickened in a way he didn’t like—as if even the thought of stepping away at this moment brought him to the edge of panic. He’d just gotten Hubert back, he could leave through that door and return and…

Ferdinand steeled himself and rose to his feet. He hadn’t let paranoia rule him yet, and he didn’t plan to start.

As he stood up, his back popped violently. He was greeted with the kind of intense, bone-deep soreness characterized from having spent a few hours asleep in a chair. That wouldn’t be good for his seat.

“Please, guard him with your life, Edelgard,” Ferdinand said, stretching out his arms.

“I shall, Your Grace,” Edelgard replied, her voice sparkling with good humor as Hubert’s already pale complexion blanched even further. Ferdinand raised an eyebrow to him, as if to say, “ _ You can joke but I cannot? _ ”

Before he left, Ferdinand paused, let his hand linger on Hubert’s for a moment longer. When Hubert squeezed back gently, weakly, Ferdinand finally took his leave.

Ferdinand went out to the pump to fetch some water. The innkeeper and her wife were up and tending to the kitchen. Although they offered Ferdinand and his roommates a seat at the table, Ferdinand assured them that one of his companions was still very ill, and in need of very gentle food. They offered him a loaf of fresh bread as well as three bowls of the beef stew simmering in the corner. He almost left after they handed him the first, and he nearly burst into tears when the older lady asked if he and his lady friend would need to eat as well. He’d been so concerned about Hubert that his own hunger had fallen by the wayside. He thanked them and tipped well before taking the tray upstairs, a fresh bucket of water hooked over his elbow.

Without being sure why, he did slow his steps as he approached the door. He was not trying to eavesdrop, though the softness of the voices inside tempted him towards the door he’d accidentally left ajar.

“They have increased the efficiency of their methods.” Hubert, his voice broke even as he dropped into a whisper. “If I survived this treatment, they planned to attempt a graft next week.”

Edelgard stayed quiet for a long time, and when she spoke, her voice seethed with anger. No, hate. The kind Ferdinand never heard from her unless she spoke of the Immaculate One. “That cannot be possible. How much cruelty has it cost to get this far?”

“It seems as though they’ve improved upon Arundel’s theories,” Hubert said, darkly. “A woman in the dungeon with me had a minor crest of Cethleann. Her faculties were quite gone, but they were successful. Another man at the far end had just received a crest of Seiros. There was some expectation that his body would accept it.” He took a heavy breath. “That is all I remember.”

“We really did find you just in time.”

“I wish you hadn’t,” Hubert said. “You should have sent someone like Bernadetta or Dorothea with him, or left me to die there with my failure.”

“Never say that to me again. I won’t allow it any longer,” Edelgard again. The pitch rose, a tone Feridnand knew well as a tell for her frustration. “What do you think you are to me, Hubert?”

“I don’t know what I was, now I’m a reminder.” Under his breath, he swore quietly. “Everything I’ve done was so you would never see these marks again.”

“ _ Hubert _ ,” she said, “they all died and you didn’t. I’m so, so grateful I woke up to find you with us, with me. There is no promise greater than that honor. You are my right arm. I was  _ adrift _ without you.” The bed creaked, as if she had sat down next to him. “They all died, Hubert. Every one of them. I was never  _ enough _ .”

Ferdinand’s mind raced, his heart thundered in his chest as it became extremely, immediately apparent that he was hearing something he absolutely should not have heard.

“ _ You should have left me to die _ .” Those words felt like a Dagdan stiletto being driven between Ferdinand’s ribs. Hubert’s voice dripped with loathing for his own survival, and Ferdinand struggled to reconcile that with how he thought his reunion with Hubert would go—what they would say to each other, how glad it made him to touch Hubert and be touched by him again. That Ferdinand wasn’t attending his funeral. The idea that Hubert didn’t feel the same—that he’d rather have been tortured to death—burned hot and ached.

And  _ Edelgard _ . The pain in her voice ran deep, like a vein of red ore jutting into the earth.

The tray shook in his hands.

“Ferdinand?” Hubert said, exiting a whisper and moving back to an authoritative bark.

Unable to hesitate any longer and brimming with guilt, Ferdinand reentered the room. Edelgard hurriedly stood up, her hands behind her back while he placed the tray on the stove in the corner. He did his best to pretend that both of them hadn’t just been having an obviously emotional conversation, and that he hadn’t tumbled into it like a clogging Svengi Fjord with a loose horseshoe.

The three of them stayed in silence as Ferdinand tore the warm bread apart. Edelgard reached for a bowl and moved back towards Hubert, but his eyes widened. His attempt to inch away was ineffective but communicated clearly enough. “Your Majesty, please—”

“After all of that?” She sighed. “Let Ferdinand feed you, at least.”

Bitterly, he gave a quick nod. Ferdinand and Edelgard swapped places again. He sat at Hubert’s bedside and stirred the soup. He forcefully ignored how Hubert—fiercely independent Hubert—tried to hide his angry, burning cheeks. Moving as quickly and painlessly as possible, Ferdinand offered a few spoonfuls of stew to Hubert. He wasn’t a great lover of food as a concept on a good day—and now he carefully chewed mushy carrots and tender chunks of beef. Edelgard sat next to him, picking apart at a handful of bread.

When Hubert said he could take no more, Ferdinand relented.

Moving over to the stove, he took a sip, then another before the dam broke and he consumed his own stew so rapidly his stomach started to ache. The two of them could barely eat—for him, it tasted better than any stew he’d had before it, better than all the finest meals at Enbarr or Garreg Mach. He didn’t want to look like he was gloating, but he ate his bowl and bread faster than he had any right to. When he paused, Edelgard and Hubert both stared incredulously back, and he felt his face flush.

Edelgard discarded her half-eaten chunk of bread back on the plate. The quilted black jacket she’d worn while travelling was hung up near the stove to dry, and she collected it as she walked by. “The wyvern squadron should be here soon.”

As she hovered near the doorway, Hubert said, “Your Majesty, if I have sounded at all ungrateful...please know it wasn’t my intent.”

Ferdinand replaced his bowl on the tray.

Edelgard paused, her back to them both. “Never throw your life away again. That is an order, and it goes for both of you.”

As he had not felt the urge to since the academy, Ferdinand shied away from her intensity. He checked Hubert for a reaction, but he looked as though he’d been slapped as Edelgard slid out the door. Hubert notedly did not insist she stay with them for safety.

Ferdinand began busying himself with stoking the fire. He deliberately looked away from Hubert, his teeth digging harshly into his cheek.

“Ferdinand,” Hubert started, “how much did you hear?”

Ferdinand tossed in a few pieces of kindling before throwing a larger cord on top of the resurrected embers. “We can talk when you’re better.”

Hubert’s uninjured hand squeezed the blankets. And Ferdinand knew he wanted to say something else, wished he would. Then at least it would feel like they could go back to Enbarr and pick up where they’d left off.

As it was, they sat in silence until Edegard returned with news that the wyvern riders and healer were close behind. “Ferdinand—”

Ferdinand made his way to Hubert and took the place at the bed where he knew Edelgard sat a moment before.

“I mean it, there will be time now,” he said, even if the force was gone from it. He raised one hand to brush aside the lock of Hubert’s bangs.

Hubert met him—his eyes two different shades of pale green—before letting himself lean forward into Ferdinand’s shoulder.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hella thanks to [GoldenThreads](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldenThreads/) for a super sharp content and line beta, and for generally just being awesome with this Absolute Unit of a chapter. Thanks also to [Nuanta](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nuanta/) who cheerled and also pointed out that I'd been spelling "Agarthan" wrong.
> 
> Thank you also to everyone who has liked and commented. This is the second multichapter fic I've ever finished and the first one in this fandom! I've been really touched by seeing people talk about it and recognize it, and it grew partly because of how positive the response was. I hope this last chapter is a nice conclusion for you.
> 
> Here are some specific content warnings for this chapter:
> 
> \- Recovery from traumatic illness  
> \- Hubert dealing with an ongoing injury  
> \- Some disordered eating  
> \- PTSD mentions
> 
> [PLEASE ALSO CHECK OUT THIS AMAZING COMM FROM IMPERATA0207 ON TWITTER OF MESSED UP HUBERT FROM CHAPTER 1](https://twitter.com/imperata0207/status/1243515681141858311?s=20)

"Do I have your _clearance_ to return to work?" Hubert asked, struggling not to sound bored. He'd already been seen by several military healers, as well as Edelgard's personal physicians. However, given the nature of his imprisonment, she'd insisted Linhardt look at him as well before she permitted him near his desk. After days of bedrest kept company by only his thoughts, Hubert reluctantly agreed.

Linhardt held a shining stone in his palm near Hubert’s face for what felt like the hundredth time since his return to Enbarr. "Well, you don't have a crest."

"Once more, I'm glad we have your medical genius on our side." Hubert fought a twitch in his eyelid.

"Just being thorough," Linhardt acknowledged, dismissing the sign for light with a flick of his hand and replacing the warm stone on a table with his other tools. "Since you weren't in their care long and they had yet to attempt a transplant, I suspect the only effect is this." He gestured toward Hubert's newly-shaded eye. "I would like to know what substance they were using, but you seem to be making a full recovery."

"Why?" Hubert prodded, a wicked smile forming on his lips as Linhardt grabbed a copper device, and placed the cup at one end to Hubert's chest. He positioned the other end in his ear. "Do you want to experiment with it? Test the bounds of nature's laws, as usual?"

"You know I'd never experiment on anyone but myself. Now be quiet," Linhardt managed, sounding bored before going silent for several beats to listen to Hubert's heart. When instructed to, Hubert breathed in and out, the metal ring cool against his chest. "You complained of an unsteady heartbeat after their treatments?"

"To put it mildly," Hubert replied, drawing his shirt closed again when Linhardt pulled away.

"Well, it seems fine now," Linhardt surmised. "Let me know if that returns in any way. I'd be surprised if it does, since you're not being exposed to the reagents anymore." A slight frown made its way onto his placid face. "How is your shoulder feeling?"

In response, Hubert scowled. "Sore, but the sharp pain is gone. The other healers said it will need to recover naturally the rest of the way."

He restrained his impulse to replace the word 'healers' with something less kind, that more accurately described his feelings on being prescribed 'rest'.

"That means not using it," Linhardt said languidly, as if repeating a script he knew by heart. "I'm serious. If you use it before it's fully healed, you could have issues for the rest of your life. Please tell me you understand?"

"No need to worry," Hubert said in his most delicate snarl, as he began trying to button up his shirt with his free hand.

"So," Linhardt said, his slow hands slipping in to make faster work of buttoning or belting Hubert's shirt and jacket. "What's it like being back from the dead? Metaphorically, I mean. It sounds like the Agarthans haven't mastered the other just yet."

"I hope they do, so I can kill them again myself." Hubert gritted his teeth as he accidentally jostled his shoulder rising from Linhardt's examination table. "Uncomfortable, if I'm being honest."

"Sounds like a lot of work," Linhardt pondered. He crossed his arms and one of his dark green brows curved in thought. "So much explaining, people looking at you, telling you how your bad experience made them feel. It'll be some time before you move unnoticed in a crowd again."

Hubert busied himself with one of the buckles on his coat, as if Linhardt had not fit it well. "Yes, well...hopefully, it will only add to my mythical status."

"But it's also an opportunity most people don't get," Linhardt continued. "Most of us don't get to see how those close to us would respond to our loss."

"You say that as if I overburden myself with the feelings of others," Hubert said. "You don't seem especially bereaved."

"Oh, no, I cried all night the day we found out. Caspar had to hold me until I fell asleep." Linhardt's nose wrinkled. "You know, I always thought I wouldn't cry—not just for you, mind you. I didn't think I was that kind of person, whatever that means. I suppose the reality of loss is sometimes different from how we imagine it. At this point, I think I would mourn anyone in our heretical little band."

Hubert sighed. "Thank you, as always, for your frankness."

"Any time," Linhardt replied absently. He etched a few final notes into the journal on his desk, which was full of spreadsheets and documentation from Hubert’s many other examinations, and then scrawled out a succinct note reading, _Hubert can work. —Linhardt_

Hubert took the note in one hand and turned to leave Linhardt's study.

"Hubert?" Linhardt queried from behind him. Hubert stopped, took a deep breath, and used all of his restraint not to turn around and snarl.

"Yes, Linhardt?" he squeezed the words out through his teeth.

Linhardt's pen hovered in midair, over his journal. He tapped it rapidly, twice, into the inkwell near his elbow, and broke his eye contact with Hubert as he went back to writing. "Glad to have you back."

The sound of Linhardt's pen scratching against paper swallowed up Hubert’s murmured response. He quickly slipped out the door, shutting it behind him as silently as he could.

Now that that was taken care of, Hubert pocketed his permission slip and began walking towards his office for his meeting with Bernadetta.

Flowers filled the main hallways of the Imperial palace. Small clusters of white asters, pale daisies, and willow sprigs were strung delicately to the lanterns. Gauzy silver and gray ribbons draped between them, and the staff worked to untangle the fragile fabrics, carefully rolling them up for use the next time someone important died.

Hubert insisted the flowers stay for a couple more days. Since they were still freshly cut when the first news of his survival arrived back in Enbarr, it would be a shame to waste them. The servants and soldiers no longer wore their mourning attire, and Hubert was grateful for that as he worked to avoid making eye contact on the way to his office.

His desk was as well decorated as any mausoleum. A dozen or so tiny bouquets ringed the floor and edges, and a quick count left him wondering how many of his seasoned agents, secretaries, and codebreakers left them there. He forbade displays like that, generally, since he never wanted to be seen profiting from his position, and also it led to a level of familiarity that was potentially inconvenient or simply awkward. However, it seemed that they'd opted to honor him when there was no fear of retribution. He hid the way that made him feel with a tight cough into his sleeve.

In the middle of it all, a masterwork bouquet greeted Hubert. Snowy snapdragons made up the body, and they poked their heads out around desert roses and frosty Dagdan succulents. Brigid alstroemerias provided stacks of pastel colors, and ferns acted to fill out the body of the arrangement.

It sat in the center of his desk, which told him Bernadetta hadn't made use of his office during her brief time taking over as Edelgard's spymaster. Upon entering his intelligence hub, he’d seen the little desk she set up outside his office, near the far window, covered with ciphers, reports, and pools of cooled wax from candles that burned too long. When Bernadetta uncomfortably led him back into his tightly-sealed office, he saw that it had been largely undisturbed save for a few removed documents and the placed floral arrangements.

"They were supposed to be lilies," Bernadetta said, tighty hugging the mess of binders in her hands. "Edelgard wanted _all_ lilies, but someone...pointed out that they would be toxic to the palace cats."

"Is that so?" Hubert barely paid attention to her words as his hands came to rest on the stitched, ruffled, fabric lily resting beside the bouquet. Like the other flowers, it was white, but its carved wooden stem had been treated with some kind of green lacquer, and a thin gold thread embroidered the very edges of the petals. "You made this one."

"I did." Bernadetta's thumb started drumming against her knuckle as she looked away. "I...worked on it while I was learning the ciphers. It gave me something to do with my hands."

"I take it that this was not originally intended as a get well present." Hubert chewed on the words, hoping they sounded dry and amused.

Bernadetta placed the stack of documents she'd been carrying on his desk. Two weeks worth of work made for a heavy thud.

"I didn't memorize all the codes," she admitted, chewing on her bottom lip. "But I was able to follow along and reply to most of the messages you received."

Hubert nodded along, though he did raise an eyebrow. "All the codes?"

"Well, yes." Bernadetta opened up a folder and started arranging the papers within by date received. "I can reliably read about half of them."

Hubert nearly spat his coffee back out into the mug he held. "Half? Bernadetta, you never cease to amaze me. These are not simple codes. Only myself and Her Majesty know them all by heart."

"Oh, I didn't...think it was that hard—not that your codes aren't good! I just, spent all my time doing it." She shifted uncomfortably, eyes widening. "Besides if I didn't, Edelgard would have had to read them all. And I didn't want her to."

"Ah," said Hubert. "Tell me, did you abort our operation in Dagda?"

She nodded. "We had no choice, everything was in chaos. All four agents were safely extracted, though." She gestured to a spot on the map behind them. "However, our asset in Almyra is still in position. I was worried but I know it took you a long time to place her there."

"Two years, in fact. And doubly valuable now that Riegan has returned." Hubert took a sip of his coffee, and placed it on the desk, far away from the cloth flower. "Besides, her station is very stable, and getting assets in or out of Almyra is highly difficult. She was safer staying there. That was a very good decision."

Bernadetta bristled and went red. "Oh...you think so? I just...thank you. I just figured...I'm glad you think it was the right choice." She systematically started cracking the joints of her fingers one by one. "I had no idea what I was doing."

Hubert, rolled his eyes up from rifling through the papers. "Bernadetta, you took on a truly monumental amount of work in a very short period of time, with no preparation. You may be able to hide how much you've done from the others, but you cannot hide it from me. That we didn't lose anyone in the chaos following my absence is...well, I'd call it a miracle, but that would do you a disservice."

As he spoke, he saw her cheeks get brighter and brighter. "Well, um, to be technical...we actually have two more than when you...left."

Hubert raised his eyebrows. "Now that you will need to explain."

"Dorothea has been talking with a couple of the dancers at the Mittelfrank Opera Company. We believe a major treasury official has been, um, stealing? Stealing. He's also not very nice to the women there." From the way her teeth started gnawing on her lip again, Hubert assumed that was an understatement, and made a mental note that he would be going on a hunt as soon as his arm was healed. "So um, they agreed to work with us."

"I will need to review their work on this first task," Hubert supplied, "but that has the potential to be very valuable."

Rich men flocked to the singers and dancers of the opera. Despite Edelgard’s efforts to weed out corruption, without the church and with the dwindling influence of crests, money made the empire move more than ever. A few men were a little too comfortable with the power that gave them. Perhaps they were quick to strike someone who refused them, or were loose-lipped when trying to impress a potential wife. They misbehaved, and simultaneously left out spools of rope for Hubert’s eventual use.

"I wasn't supposed to be doing it forever," Bernadetta added, quickly, before anything as uncomfortable as silence could be had or stretched out. "Just until Edelgard found someone…"

 _Better_ , she'd likely been intending to say ‘better’. Fortunately, she didn't finish the thought, which spared Hubert the expense of telling her that Edelgard had, already, certainly, found that someone.

They did stand in silence after that, Hubert pouring over Bernadetta's immaculate notes and her getting increasingly fidgety next to him. He took careful sips from his coffee while he brought himself up to speed on everything she'd done since he'd been gone.

"Bernadetta, you don't have to stay here while I read this," he said. "I can always ask you if I have any questions."

She jerked back as though he'd yelled, and he cringed lightly in response. He hadn't meant to startle her. But she shook her head.

"Oh, no, I'm sorry. It wasn't that. You probably don't like me standing here. What with everything you've been through."

"I prefer that you not know what I've been through, Bernadetta." Hubert laid the report back on his desk. "I lived it, and don't see why anyone else needs to imagine it. Let us just pretend that I fell down a crevasse."

"It's _not that either_ ," Bernadetta paused, her hands knitting tightly in front of her.

He tilted his head. "What is it, then?"

Bernadetta swept in quickly, careful to avoid his slung arm as her own arms wrapped around him tightly. She pressed her cheek into the side of his chest, hiding her face as she squeezed. He wasn't sure he could extract her if he'd wanted to, and instead opted for settling his hand between her shaking shoulders.

He remained like that until her eyes finally dried, and her quiet sobbing ceased.

When Hubert went to Dorothea’s quarters, ostensibly for more information about the new trainees at the opera, he found them empty.

However, Dorothea’s quarters hadn’t been his primary guess for where he would find her anyway; that he went there first was more of a courtesy. Petra had travelled from Brigid and was staying at her suite in the diplomatic wing of the palace. Due to Petra’s service during the war, her close personal friendship with Edelgard, and as part of ongoing reparations for years of imperial rule, Petra had permanent rooms in the palace, available either for her use or for visitors from her family or government. Hubert could not be sure that he would find Dorothea there, but it was not the hardest puzzle he’d ever solved.

“Hubert! You are looking much more well,” Petra greeted, her eyes shining bright in the low candlelight and warm decorations of her suite. She gestured for him to come inside. “I apologize. I did not expect your visit tonight.”

She, along with the other former Black Eagles, had come to visit him immediately after his arrival back in Enbarr. It shamed him to say that he remembered that period of time poorly.

He inclined his head and stepped through the door. “Your Highness, the fault is mine for bothering you so late—” 

Petra clasped his good shoulder and took his free hand in her other palm. Hubert smothered the surge of pain even that small movement sent through his bones, and offered a smile that felt crooked and weak. When she placed warm hands affectionately on his jaw and drew him down so she could kiss his forehead, he bent his head in assent. She offered the silent affirmation without any expectation that it would be returned, and he doubted she would allow him to dismiss it.

Petra leaned back and offered a comforting, camaraderie squeeze with her palm. “I am glad you are not with the spirits, friend.”

Hubert imagined her spirits would take one look at his life and deeds before throwing him back like a hagfish, but that response died on his tongue as Petra sat back on her heels. “Dorothea and I were just having coffee. Would you like some?”

“I happen to be looking for Dorothea, Your Highness, so I thank you for pardoning my intrusion. Although I’m glad to be able to see you as well.” He blinked. “As for the coffee, I’m sure I would be scolded.”

“Healers cannot complain when they are not present.” Petra waved a hand in the air as she led him inside.

From the end of the hallway, a voice called out. “Is that company, Petra? Should I get decent?”

“It is Hubert,” Petra responded, with a kind of genuine cheer that did not usually accompany his name. There was a time that may have annoyed him, but at present, it hardly registered.

“Oh,” Dorothea said. “No need then.”

Petra led him into a room decorated with elaborate carvings and rich, patterned blankets. A Duscur coffee pot and cups burned over a magic stone that Dorothea tended to with an absent hand. She sat on the futon in a nest of pillows, a red silk robe draping off of her shoulders as she greeted him through her mane of brown hair. He had not seen Dorothea dressed down often—even during the war, her little vanities brought her a great deal of comfort. He remembered her finally taking pity on Ferdinand and showing him how to trim the split ends of his hair.

Now, she simply looked relaxed. “Hubie, nice to see you up and about.”

“People are very concerned with how ambulatory I am,” Hubert responded, taking a seat on the chair catty cornered to the futon as Petra went about distributing the small, bronzed cups sitting on the classically Adrestian coffee table. With quick hands she began pouring coffee from a long spout, and Hubert let himself have a moment to settle into his seat, breathing in the rich, bitter aroma. His appetite was still poor, but it reassured him that something as simple as coffee could remind him that he was once more haunting the Imperial Palace. It was no mirage.

Dorothea regarded him behind a veil of thick hair, and as always, her smile added a kind of amused, evaluating quality to her porcelain cheeks. It was a dire mistake to confuse her for a singing doll. That was not an error Hubert had made in a very long time.

“So, Linhardt let you go back to work,” Dorothea said, by way of conversation, moving her legs to allow Petra to sit down before once more draping her legs over Petra’s thighs. “I can’t imagine.”

“You know me,” Hubert said. He took a sip of his coffee. It was powerful, extremely rich and bitter, but with an undercurrent of chocolatey sweetness he had a hard time placing. Absently, he thought Ferdinand would like it quite a bit. “I would prefer things return to normal as soon as possible.”

“I suppose that’s understandable.” Dorothea took a sip of her own coffee. “Speaking of normal, I was surprised Ferdie left so soon after you came back.”

Hubert eyed her.

Five days ago, after Hubert was confirmed as stable and resettled in his rooms, Ferdinand quit Enbarr and rode for Hrym territory, with a few utterances about a letter from Lysithea. Hubert had been well enough to see Ferdinand off at the stables, and Ferdinand promised he would be back shortly. They'd stood apart. Hubert remembered the way his words of farewell creaked out of him, because what else could he say with Ferdinand leaving so suddenly, with so much between them. After Ferdinand and his horse vanished from sight, Hubert returned to his sanctioned (if maddening) bedrest.

“He has business in Hrym.” Hubert leaned back in his chair, and tapped the wooden arm. “As romantic as it would be for him to be with me, I am well. Though trust me, he got his fill of weeping at my bedside.”

“I hope Lysithea is well,” Petra said. “I know her health has been strong for some time now.” Petra spoke hopefully but cautiously, in the universal language of someone who wanted to avoid a jinx.

Hubert took another sip of his coffee. He suspected Lysithea was fine.

“Right,” Dorothea chewed on the word. “I’m sure he’ll be back soon.”

Hubert made a noncommittal noise.

Gently, Dorothea reached out to Petra’s shoulder. “Petra, darling, could you please fetch me some water?”

Petra’s eyes flitted between Dorothea and Hubert. With a nod of acknowledgement and a pat on Dorothea’s hip, Petra rose to her feet and strode from the room. As she left, Hubert caught the smile and fond eyes Dorothea followed Petra with, the line of her mouth slightly upturned. Hubert sometimes doubted love when he saw it—he’d witnessed too many people who used romance as a weapon—but he knew enough of Dorothea to see that the devotion on her face was true.

“Well,” Dorothea said, rounding on Hubert, her smile turning into an echo of what it had just been, “I suppose I can thank you for bringing Petra back to Enbarr, but...” Her eyes darted downwards. “Hubie, if you want to talk—”

“I very much don’t. No offense.” His fingers ceased their warlike drumming. “Contrary to popular belief, I am susceptible to horror. Pain. Fear. Ferdinand and Her Majesty have already been burdened with that—I will relive it on my own time.”

Dorothea’s face fell. “No...about Ferdinand.”

Hubert cast his eyes off into the distance, and his stomach ached. “What did he tell you?”

“Enough.” Her eyes were doe-soft, her lips gently turned. When he did not respond, she continued. “He said you were very sick, and that he thought you might die. After you woke up, he overheard you say he should have left you there.”

“Let me guess: that wasn’t very romantic of me?”

“With you and Ferdie, I’ve given up trying to guess what romance looks like.” She frowned at him, then took another sip from her coffee. “But it doesn’t _sound_ like someone who was happy to see their lover again after a long and troubled parting.”

“Perhaps I _wasn’t_ happy to see him or Edelgard there with me, in a place where wretched things had been done.” As a habit, he forced a hand through his bangs. "My declaration, while thoughtless, was true. They should not have come for me. They risked their lives for mine when mine was given gladly, knowing they would be safe."

"With all due respect: what does Edelgard's life look like without you? Or Ferdinand's, for that matter? Safety isn't everything." Dorothea spoke carefully, skirting around a tinge to her voice that might have been caution or judgement.

Hubert wanted to lash out, wanted to argue, wanted to tell her about what he saw in his fever dreams and in the shadows of his cell. The nightmares his own mind created for him that no course of horrific treatments could match.

But what could he say?

"Ferdinand may no longer see it that way." His injured hand carefully squeezed and loosened, testing the muscles and tendons in his arm, waiting for them to sew back together and stop aching. “It’s one thing to understand the nature of my loyalties and duty, and another thing to witness the consequences.”

"Hubie, Ferdinand also serves Edie." Dorothea's nails ran over the side of her cup. “Maybe someday we’ll all stop underestimating him.”

“We’ll see.” Hubert squeezed his eyes shut.

"You've both been through so much lately. That would strain any relationship. I'm sure you'll talk about it when he comes back to Enbarr."

Hubert's elbow itched in his sling, and he fidgeted instead of trying to address it. He refrained from telling Dorothea that yes, he knew that he and Ferdinand would have to talk when Ferdinand returned to Enbarr.

Hubert feared it like a man would fear his trial date.

When Petra returned, Hubert bid them both good night, and Petra led him back out the door.

“Petra, is that a new tattoo?”

Her gaze followed his down to a new patch of pink skin peeking out from under the sleeve of her top. An eagle in a motif of blocks, lines, and black dots held a spindly serpent filled out in spiralling patterns. The swelling had gone down, but he could tell it had been done recently.

“Yes,” she responded. “I...it is a custom in Brigid. To mark major life events.” She met his eyes, and once more reached out to his shoulder. “Please do not go dying again. I will not get a second.”

He smiled back, and inclined his head. “I would hate to inconvenience you again, Your Highness.”

He was back in his rooms, the taste of good coffee still on his tongue, when he remembered that he’d forgotten to ask Dorothea about the dancers, and cursed lightly as he pressed a finger to his temple.

The next day, Hubert sought Edelgard out in her rooms and found them unlocked. The key he kept on his person made sure no door in the palace was closed to him, but he and Edelgard possessed a stringent code for privacy, one they mutually needed and respected. Although her rooms were quiet, he took the open door to mean strict solitude was not her wish.

Her suite was dark in the late afternoon. Unlit from the position of the sun and gray from overcast. In winter it could chill easily, but it stayed cool in summer.

It was also nearly completely empty.

With rain possibly coming and night falling, a healthy fire was supposed to be ablaze in the hearth. Edelgard's maids should have been bustling, getting ready to receive their lady in time for her to attend dinner. That they weren't there meant she'd given them the day to themselves—with pay.

He sighed, heavily, and pinched the bridge of his nose as he walked through the empty suite.

From her room, he heard some movement. Drawers being opened and closed. Toiletries clattering lightly.

He passed through the door just in time to watch Edelgard toss a hairbrush back onto her vanity in frustration. In the mirror, he spied the tremor in her hands—an injury long healed, but that her body catalogued, returned to at inconvenient moments. Particularly after nightmares. She'd put her dress on, but her hair remained in an unbraided cascade down her back.

She saw him in the reflection of her mirror.

“Your Majesty,” he said, by way of greeting, even as his voice caught.

“You shouldn’t be back at work yet, Hubert,” Edelgard chastised. “You were on Death’s door less than a week ago.”

“Linhardt said it was fine.” He gestured to his coat pocket. “I have a note.”

He saw Edelgard’s reflection pinch her lips together tightly, and her violet eyes lit up in a flash of annoyance. “I know.”

Her tone of voice implied, heavily, that she still thought it was a poor idea.

“He believed it would be best for my constitution.” Hubert approached the vanity, his eyes falling on the missed button on the back of her dress, on the places where she’d been chewing her nails. Little details, minor notes, things no one but him knew to look for. “Now, please. The Professor will be here in a little under an hour. How may I assist you?”

He’d been asking for a week—if he could light the fires in her rooms, if he could sift through her correspondence, if he could take the place of her taster—and each time she’d refused him.

Edelgard sighed. “You’re going to be like this until I have you do something for me, aren’t you?”

Hubert’s jaw clamped shut, and a spike of panic lanced through his chest. He stood stiffly, unsure what to do with his good arm, before he felt himself deflate. His shoulders slumped a micrometer, and he caught himself smiling fondly at her back.

“I fear you know me too well.” He saw her watching him via the shine of her mirror.

She let out a sigh. “Fine. If you must do something, then you can braid my hair. Though if I catch you using your injured arm I will throw you out.”

As if moving automatically, Hubert removed a chair from the other corner of the room. It was irritating with one hand, but he dragged it into position behind her seat with minimal squealing and no scratches on the floor, which he considered a victory.

He took his place, and started off by running his hand through her brushed hair. It stood out, stark white against his palm, and that color burned his fingers like guilt. It had always been a reminder for both of them, of the cost of failure, of a period of time when her hands shook too badly to manage her own care. Hubert had needed to learn the aesthetics of a lady’s presentation, as his father had forbidden any of her maids from seeing her like that.

Those Who Slithered whispered of a new dawn, and noblemen clapped themselves on the backs, drinking port, smoking cigars, talking about a job well done and a line secure. All while wiping the sweat off their greasy brows when they realized Edelgard had saved their own brats from death and damnation. Brats like Ferdinand. Or Linhardt and Caspar. Bernadetta. Hubert’s own sorry life. Dorothea and a hundred other streetside orphans the Enbarr guardsmen wouldn’t have missed.

Hubert separated her hair into two large strands, draping the white around her front to hold them while he split the first half in threes again, like streams into rivers into the sea.

He began overlapping the threads with each other. Maintaining the required tension with one hand was difficult, but no less so than anything else he’d done for her, needing to get her ready before state functions while she sat dimly in front of her mirror. By being the strongest, or simply by being lucky, she’d saved others, and she’d vowed to save more. Hubert was willing to throw his lot in with her either way. If it ruined the world. If it cost them both their heads. He’d never regretted that choice.

And he’d almost dragged her back into it.

“You are quiet, Hubert,” she said, voice even, working in time to his wrapping of the strands, like the way Srengi dead were prepared in their crypts. His shame deserved to choke on the knots.

“Merely considering the past. How far we’ve come.” He finished the first braid, and moved onto the second one, drawing her loose hair back across her shoulder and letting it fall to her waist. It fell through his fingers like quicksilver. “As always, I fear my work is substandard. Your maids would be furious with me for sending you out the door like this.”

She sat in silence for a while, broken only by the sound of him working a tight band around the ends. “I still like the way you do it best.”

“You’re too kind.” He placed a pair of pins in his mouth, and began to draw up the first braid. “Your Majesty…”

“If you’re going to apologize again, save it,” she said, her voice as pointed as a knife. “We’ve always carried our weights together. Let me carry this with you as your friend.” Her voice hitched, mild, indistinguishable, like seeing a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye. Her hand came up to his, pausing his study of his work on the pins. “Please, just let me be glad that you’re home.”

“You misunderstand, I was not going to repeat my prior ungratefulness.” He fought a lump in his throat. “I merely...wished to say how much I admire you. I won’t make either of us uncomfortable by dwelling on what has been done, but I hope...caring for me gave you closure.”

“It did,” she said, her voice like a whisper, quiet and far away. “It did, Hubert.”

Her hand over his fingers shook, the ghost of a tremor from long ago.

“I have a question,” she broached. "Why didn't you take the drought in your pocket?"

Ah, his own retainer. The death he kept for himself in the situation that all was lost, when he could not allow the Emperor's spymaster to fall into enemy hands, and all that laid before him was pain.

His memory was fuzzy, of course. He remembered thinking about Edelgard on her throne, and Ferdinand falling to safety as his hand floated to his coat pocket. They’d seemed like pleasant enough thoughts, something to ease him into the sweet dream of his poison, sparing him from torture and the treasons it could bring.

Instead, he’d hesitated. “A moment of weakness.”

That was all it had taken, before he’d been overwhelmed.

“You wanted to live?”

His own hand shook as he drew away from her. He dropped his gaze away from the mirror. “You know it is my desire to spend my life in your service?”

“You’ve said as such many times.”

“If it keeps you safe, I will gladly give it. I _meant_ to give it.” His face tightened, the muscles along his back coiled and vibrated. “I thought of Ferdinand.” He drew up her second braid, disregarding the pins that fell to the floor.

She was quiet for a long time. “You wanted to see him again.”

“That implies I did not also want to return to you.” He had, badly. “But suddenly...it was different.” He sniffed, blaming the room’s dry air. “I believe he plans on ending our arrangement.”

Edelgard’s face fell into a deep frown. “Why do you say that?”

“He deserves more. Someone who can dedicate themselves to him entirely.”

He picked up her horned crown, and placed the wired frame around her braids, making sure the darkly beaded rivulets in the back hung free. 

Edelgard swiveled in her seat to face him, her expression gravely serious and deeply familiar to him.

“Do you think I...Hubert I feel every day that I don’t deserve Byleth. We probably all deserve the fires of eternity. No amount of love or caring for each other can really wash that blood away, can it? When that day comes, I’ll meet those shades proudly. This world, safe and stable, is my penance. It’s not enough, but it’s what I have.” She tilted her chin up, like a woman facing an unseen judge. “Hubert, it’s not about what Ferdinand deserves. It’s about what he wants.”

He dropped to his knees, fighting a wave of dizziness, a tightness in his chest that he couldn’t place. As he fell, she reached out to his hand. When he tried to pull away, she held him tighter, as if she intended to pull him into her lap like a child. He looked up, and regarded his work from below. Not a hair out of place. Perfect. Regal. The mother of a new world, sister of the dead, and Emperor of Adrestia.

His dearest friend.

“Edelgard.”

“No matter what happens, Hubert, please know...I will be there for you. I will never fail you like that again. That’s _my_ vow.”

He knelt before her, his hand folded in her palms and his face buried in her knees as she leaned down to press her forehead into his, he leaned into her skirts as something ripped free from him, and tears darkened the red of her dress.

That evening, the Emperor took a quiet, early dinner with her inner circle in a small hall nestled near the western garden. Hubert took his place at her side. He sat opposite Byleth Eisner, soon-to-be Empress consort, freshly returned from Almyra and seemingly the only person in the room Edelgard had eyes for. After being the subject of everyone’s attention for a week, Hubert hardly begrudged her the affection. He drank water from his crystal glass while Caspar nearly spilled ale on Linhardt in the process of exuberantly telling some story, and Dorothea and Petra shared wine. Next to them, Bernadetta’s needle flashed in her quick hands, though she smiled often, and occasionally contributed to the conversation.

Hubert focused on wrangling his appetite into behaving—he picked off the tail of a fatty sautéed fish from the spread for protein. Likewise, he opted for some rice to fill his plate, and chewed on some scant helpings of summer vegetables from the pasta salad for appearances. His stomach remained too tense for anything that had been pickled in sour weeds, which would be his preference.

And still, his eyes scanned the crowd of those nearest to him, and for a moment he allowed himself to embrace being with them, though one voice remained absent, one bright flash of auburn hair gone from his vision. It was odd how easily their little group had paired off, how blissfully invisible Hubert became without Ferdinand there. Because he was in Hrym. Because he’d not been able to bear a moment more of Hubert’s morbid recovery.

He chased a few flakes of lemony whitefish with a sip of water, and did his best not to think about how he was a dead man a week ago. One that moved and breathed and writhed on a cold floor and screamed when prodded, but dead. 

Hubert fought the temptation to shove his plate away.

Next to him, Edelgard rose from her seat, and he glanced to the side just long enough to watch her gloved hand linger on Byleth’s. Byleth watched Edelgard leave, a smile on her face. When Edelgard was out of sight, she fixed on Hubert and cautiously slid into the seat Edelgard had just occupied, bringing her next to him, and he realized his as-yet unattended presence at their little feast was about to end.

“Professor.” It would be ‘Your Grace’ soon. He didn’t know what else they had to say to each other, as they’d already done performative embraces at the wyvern mew upon her return.

“Hubert,” Byleth leaned conspiratorially near him, her broad shoulders spreading out with her elbows as she brought her head close enough to him to whisper.

“I hope you’re not about to tell me you’re glad I’m alive,” Hubert responded. “Not that it’s unappreciated.” Surely she of all people would understand that his sutures would tear if one more person told him how much they’d missed him.

“I think action is a better offering, don’t you?” Byleth said, and he smiled at the coldness in her voice, the calm ruthless edge that reminded him his lady would have been well protected in his absence. Since the death of the Archbishop, Byleth’s demeanor had changed, her awareness of courtly scripts had sharpened, even if her performance of them was sometimes left as wanting as Hubert’s own. “We’ll have their heads, Hubert.”

He thought of Arundel on a pike, and the grin that already felt cruel widened. “Of course, you know the bouquet I would appreciate most.” He sighed, and laid down his glass. “However, for the time being—”

“What are you two talking about?” Edelgard asked, materializing at Byleth’s shoulder as if by warp spell.

“Revenge,” Byleth replied, voice still serious as Edelgard’s hand smoothed down the shoulder of her fiancée’s jacket.

Hubert hid a chuckle in the shore of his water glass. Edelgard’s eyes flashed in concern, and Byleth’s expression lapsed back into a small smile, her eyes growing kind again at the sight of Edelgard. He’d been about to say that Edelgard would need her, and when she looked back to Hubert, he felt as though she understood.

Byleth kissed Edelgard’s hand, near where her father’s ring sparkled. “Please, pay it no mind, my love.”

“We’re merely plotting,” Hubert responded.

“You’ll have to put it on hold, I’m afraid.” Edelgard glanced behind her shoulder. “Look who I found.”

Hubert excitedly looked to the door, and tried to contain the flutter he felt in his chest in the seconds before Ferdinand emerged at the threshold. His hair still had a faint trace of dampness, as though he’d scrubbed off frantically after a hard day’s ride, and he wore a blue and red evening suit, cravat artfully held in place with a gold pin that glittered against the white silk. When the others saw him, a cheer of camaraderie rose up.

Hubert remained seated, partly because he was still tired enough that the thought of rising to his feet made him nauseous again, and partly because he wanted to watch the way their band parted for Ferdinand. The way Petra rose to embrace him. The way Dorothea kissed both sides of his face before giving him a light hug. Caspar delivering a hearty clap to the back—a greeting he’d been _expressly_ forbidden from delivering to Hubert.

As the Black Eagles resettled, Ferdinand approached Hubert.

“Hubert,” he said, the smile on his face fading into a calmer cheer, “are you well?”

“Well enough.” Hubert nodded, and slid his chair to the right to make room for Ferdinand, who took a seat next to him. Ferdinand lowered himself into the chair, and Hubert may have been imagining the brush of Ferdinand’s hand on the sleeve of his forearm.

The next course was peach sorbet served in chilled crystal cups, though Hubert barely paid attention as the staff deposited servings in front of each guest. His eyes were fixed on Ferdinand, answering a question from Bernadetta from across the table. His sorbet was there and then gone. Notably, he did not fixate his attention on Hubert, aside from leaning near him to ask if he needed anything, to which Hubert responded in the negative. He saw exhaustion in Ferdinand; he saw something else as well.

Now, with all of them together, Ferdinand entered the conversation, his usual enthusiasm remained muted even as he too-confidently responded to offered jokes or anecdotes. He got into a hearty conversation with Petra about the trade agreement with Dagda, yet still found time to brag to Edelgard and Byleth about the speed of his return trip from Hrym. Finally, Ferdinand’s arrival seemed to strip away the years, and Hubert imagined them all in black and gold once more.

What was unusual was how every time Ferdinand’s attention fixed on Hubert, it seemed to flit away, slip over him like he was covered in a sheet of ice. Even during their academy days, that glance in Hubert’s direction would have been tainted with anger, like a mage sending up a flare.

Hubert didn’t think it was a punishment, nor did he take it as a sign of anything good to come. He waited for the other boot, for Ferdinand to lean over, eyes downcast, and suggest they speak somewhere privately.

After some time, Hubert awkwardly surrendered, and decided he may as well be the one to start it. He dropped his spoon in the melted remains of his dessert as staff replaced each cup with a saucer and serving of tea. “Ferdinand.”

“Yes?”

“After tea, would you like to accompany me for a walk in the gardens? I feel the need to let my food settle.”

Ferdinand blinked, taking a sip of tea before placing it back on the porcelain. “Of course, Hubert.”

Reports of rain had, it turned out, been mistaken. A softening mist fell over green hills and gardens, glowing silver, orange and blue in the last light from the sun, which bled red across the estate. Hubert noted that this perhaps marked the perfect time of day for the two of them to walk. Neither day nor night, instead they met in the middle, as they’d learned to. Enbarr’s summer was well upon them, and even with night falling it likely would not grow too cold, though the first traces of chill sat on the wind.

As they walked in silence, Hubert’s gaze fell back to a gazebo at the far end of the garden—Edelgard sat with her head on Byleth’s shoulder, and Byleth held her hand tightly in return. He couldn’t see their expressions, but he saw some of that world weariness draining from Edelgard’s shoulders. He knew it would never truly go away, but at least she had a respite.

He was glad Edelgard had Byleth.

Ferdinand watched Hubert carefully, hands primly folded behind him.

“How was your ride from Hrym?” Hubert broke their stalemate, even as his stomach twisted. He’d survived much in the last few weeks—he could survive Ferdinand ending their strange courtship.

“There was no trouble,” Ferdinand replied. “Lysithea is well.”

“It gladdens me to hear it.” Hubert had guessed, but his shoulders did relax somewhat.

“I actually...went to speak to her.” Ferdinand drew to a stop, one hand nervously wrapping around his opposing elbow. Hubert paused alongside him.

“I had thought as much.”

Hubert smelled roses in full bloom, warring with the shrubs even as they climbed lattices built for morning glories. Ferdinand’s jacket cut quite the feature, somehow making the red roses behind him stand out, seem more brilliant as the last traces of the sun glanced off their petals. He squinted against the last of it, reddish hair looking a shade closer to gold, and his jaw sticking up and out finely, proudly. Recently, Hubert would have been in the habit of curving his index finger under that chin, drawing Ferdinand in for a kiss. He wanted to. He refrained.

Ferdinand’s cravat moved as he worked his throat, before turning to face Hubert, the most miserable expression on his face—mouth set into a soft frown, eyebrows arching over eyes that looked like they were about to combust.

“You know what was done to her?”

“I now have first hand knowledge,” Hubert said, and although he tried to carry it as a dark joke, his voice hitched.

“I wanted to understand,” Ferdinand said. “She was...gracious enough to listen, and to explain things.” He bit his lower lip. “My father did that to people. Children.”

“He arranged it, which is nearly worse.” Hubert, once more, fought the urge to grab for Ferdinand. Hold him, as he’d grown accustomed to. “Our enemy has deep pockets, and wears many faces.”

“You can say that he was just another puppet, Hubert,” Ferdinand assented. “I won’t be mad.”

Hubert’s slung arm ached, and he fought the urge to pick at the edges of the bandages on his thumb, since it was starting to itch quite badly. “It wasn’t my wish for you to see or know anything more than you already did.”

“This is a strange time to become chivalrous. How could I leave it at that, knowing the truth was even worse?” Ferdinand seemed preoccupied with a blossom, his gloved hand reaching out to cup it.

“You should have let me bear it.” Hubert turned to him, his voice nearly crawling with a whisper, desperate in his throat.

“That’s not quite what you said at the inn, isn’t it?” Ferdinand took in a sharp breath, and looked just flustered enough to keep his words from coming out hot and angry. It felt familiar. “Hubert, if you tell me to my face that I should have left you there to rot, I will cry.”

“You did hear,” Hubert confirmed, nervously digging at a weed in the walkway with the black heel of his boot. “Are such declarations really so unusual for me?”

“No, but we also never thought you were dead before,” Ferdinand said back, a distinct distance to his voice. “What was I supposed to do?”

“You should have stayed _safe_.” Hubert threw force onto the last word, making it sound like an accusation. “A poorly laid trap is still a trap. I was bait, and the two of you took it. You risked everything.”

“It was myself and Edelgard—”

“That was _everything_ , Ferdinand.” Hubert’s chest twisted around him, and his shoulder throbbed. “The only thing that gave me strength during my confinement was the thought that the two of you were safe. Imagine my horror to see you there.” 

Ferdinand closed his eyes, as if reigning in a bitter retort. When he let out his next breath, he seemed to deflate between his own shoulders. “I am so glad you are home, Hubert. I do not wish to fight.”

“Nor I,” Hubert said, “though it seems there are things we must sorely discuss.”

“Like what?” Ferdinand asked.

“The past, and the future.” Hubert madly thought of Ferdinand laying on him in his room in Enbarr, and he thought of Ferdinand awkwardly sleeping at his bedside at the inn. “How I can’t take back what I said.”

Ferdinand shook his head. “I did not ask you to.”

“You deserve to be with someone who thinks of you first and absolutely. Who can promise to be with you, and you alone. The war is over, Ferdinand, but mine still rages on, and may yet cost my life.” Hubert chewed on his lip, and again painfully tested his wounded arm. “You should...I _want_ you to be with someone who can offer you more. If you seek to end what we have, I understand.”

Ferdinand’s eyes sparked and he opened his mouth to speak, to retort in that familiar way, and it comforted Hubert somewhat to see that hot, angry flame still able to make its way to the surface. “You think _I_ should end our arrangement?”

“Isn’t that what you were planning on doing?” Sweat had begun collecting under Hubert’s collar. There was a time he’d relished the moment when he could push Ferdinand to biting, stumbling haplessly into another one-sided debate; now, it only twisted a knife.

“I cannot believe you. All the warmth and tact of a lizard, as always.” Ferdinand let out an angry breath. “I have always known you to be doused in pitch and playing with matches. Why would that change anything for me now?”

“All the more reason not to stand beside me.” Hubert swept in, towards Ferdinand’s shoulder. “What would you have done had I not been there? What if the two of you had been overwhelmed? You didn’t think, and I don’t play.”

“We knew the risks and accepted them. The only one who cannot seem to do that is you.” Ferdinand bit at his lip, made as if he intended to walk off but instead paced back towards Hubert. “And I am sick of you trying to make this about your service. I know Edelgard will always come first—I have accepted that, but do not insult our Emperor by using her as an excuse not to get close to anyone else.”

Hubert blinked. “I feel like that is an exaggeration—”

“ _Is_ it?” Ferdinand snapped, and Hubert thought he detected the lightest shine to Ferdinand’s eyes. “I will not be your excuse either. I meant every second of what I said at the inn.”

“What?” Hubert said, trying to keep the bitterness from his voice. “That you _love_ me?”

As soon as the words left his mouth, Hubert knew they were a mistake. Ferdinand didn’t slap him, didn’t yell—he just stood there, eyes wide as silver coins and mouth hanging open. He looked like he had when walking back into Hubert’s sickroom, when he had the same kind of tragic expression on his face he might have had if Hubert stabbed him over a clutch of primroses.

“I see,” Ferdinand said, clipped and quick. “I said it, and it is true. So we both overheard things we were not supposed to. I never asked you to say it back.”

Overhead, a swarm of swallows glided by. The sun was gone, and the palace lights were being lit behind sparkling glass windows.

Even knowing he shouldn’t, Hubert reached for Ferdinand. The tips of his gloved fingers brushed against the bone on Ferdinand’s wrist, before sliding down to his palm.

“I didn’t say I wouldn’t return it,” he said. “That’s why you have to stop this. I’m not sure I can.”

Ferdinand’s hand twisted around so it was holding Hubert’s, and suddenly they were pressed, palms together, Hubert’s one hand in both of Ferdinand’s. Before he knew it, Ferdinand was all honeyed sweetness looking into him.

“Then do not.” Ferdinand raised Hubert’s hand to his lips and kissed the covered knuckles there. “You have been talking a lot about what I need. Can you _listen_ to me?”

Hubert planted his heels in the grass, bracing as Ferdinand moved into him, bringing with him the smell of salt from the road, the warmth being taken away by the cooling breeze. He allowed Ferdinand to press closer, his forehead brushing against the tip of Hubert’s nose. The swell of feeling in Hubert’s chest, the—steady, normalized—racing of his heart, reminded him of what a mistake he’d made.

Ferdinand broke apart from him, and Hubert fought his body’s need to follow that familiar pressure. Still holding Hubert’s hand, Ferdinand faced him.

“What if it had been me?”

Hubert paused, confused as he struggled to process what had just been said.

“Pardon?”

“What if I had been the one taken instead? What if you had reason to believe I was alive and in pain?” Ferdinand spoke candidly, evenly, as if each question wasn’t a carefully crafted blow to Hubert’s stomach. “Would you leave me to die from my error?”

Hubert shook his head. “It’s not the same.”

“Answer the question.” Ferdinand squeezed his hand.

“I would have brought you home, even if it meant all I accomplished was the filling of a casket. I would have found the men that hurt you,” Hubert carried on, fighting a surge of something sick and cold in his gut—an anger so deep it bordered on mania, threatened to bubble up as a laugh. “There’d have been no place to hide from me. I’d have smothered them in miasma. Cracked their bones and boiled their blood.”

“And why is that?” Ferdinand pressed.

“Because I love you.” It felt like a string snapped somewhere in Hubert, and the pain of it echoed through him, making his own bones hum.

Ferdinand moved quickly, grasping at the back of Hubert’s neck and pressing their foreheads together. Despite himself, the flare of adrenaline coursing through him, Hubert sank into that heat.

“I am meant to be expendable.” Hubert’s hand shuddered violently in Ferdinand’s. “I was never supposed to be someone you couldn’t bear to lose.”

“You are not expendable. Not to me, and not to Edelgard.” When Ferdinand continued, his words practically disappeared into Hubert’s chest. “You have become half my sky, Hubert.”

Hubert broke, and crashed his lips into Ferdinand’s.

His good arm wrapped around Ferdinand’s waist—as it had done a hundred times now, and a hundred more in his somber delusions. Ferdinand kissed back, softly around Hubert’s own—not sobs. When he broke away, he tasted salt on his lips, and he had no way of knowing whether it came from Ferdinand or himself.

Hubert’s hand came up to Ferdinand’s shoulders, and they swayed together in a kind of lightness, the elation that always follows a confession. Ferdinand rose up to kiss him again, his hand scraping over the freshly clipped hair at the base of Hubert’s skull.

“I don’t know that I can be who you need,” Hubert gasped into Ferdinand’s lips. “But I want to try, as long as I am able.”

“You already are,” Ferdinand said, back. “I will bet our second chance on that.”

They sank into each other, and stayed there until the moon was rising, silver replacing the amber glow from the palace as lights were doused and most of the household prepared to retreat to their quarters.

Hubert had made his own bet. One he’d thought he’d lost before Ferdinand followed him into the shadows and vowed to repay his cost ten fold.

They would go back to one of their rooms, and they would talk and huddle until they slept. When morning came, Ferdinand would extract himself from bed, careful not to jostle Hubert’s arm, and would go for his morning ride or to lunge one of the green horses he was preparing to start under saddle. Hubert would return to work, trying to repair some of the damage that had been done in his absence without undoing the intricate embroidery that had been Bernadetta’s desperate adoption of his job. In time Hubert’s arm would heal, and he would return to his shadowy war, if more wisely and carefully than he had before. He didn’t know what else he could promise.

But when Ferdinand retired for the night, Hubert followed him.


End file.
